But now, SRI Ventures, a kind of startup incubator within the Menlo Park research and development firm SRI International, is investing in and spinning out a startup called Abundant Robotics Inc. to automate apple harvesting with agricultural robots currently in development.

The robots, as yet unnamed, were designed to be strong and fast enough to remove one fruit per second from a tree, but gentle enough not to damage trees or the fruit, according to Abundant Robotics' CEO and co-founder Dan Steere.

They employ computer vision to recognize apples on the branch that are ready for harvesting, and a kind of vacuum to remove the apples, Steere said.

For power, the robots are plugged into the small tractors already used pervasively in fruit farming.

Steere co-founded Abundant Robotics about a year ago, he says, with CTO Curt Salisbury and Senior Software Architect Michael Eriksen recognizing a massive market opportunity in agriculture.