Highly Objective

Hosted by Dai Truong

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Nov 2024

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Conversations with leading executives and investors in the Cannabis industry.

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November 27, 202439 min

Distru, CEO, Blaine Hatab

Distru raised $3M in July 2019 from Felicis and Global Founders and didn't raise again until November 2024. Poseidon led the $6M Series A, its first time investing in the Company. 💡 Founding Story and Early Focus on Distribution. Blaine Hatab, Co-Founder & CEO of Distru, discusses the company's founding story. Distru was initially focused on building software to enable cannabis distribution (hence the name Distru), as Blaine saw Distribution as a key part of the supply chain that would be crucial as the industry grew. The company started with just $30,000 in funding from Blaine's personal network and built the initial product by constantly talking to operators to understand their needs. 🖥️ Evolution from CRM to full ERP. Distru started as a CRM and mapping tool for sales reps, but quickly realized their customers needed more robust inventory management and distribution capabilities. Distru expanded its product to become a full ERP system, adding manufacturing and other features to serve the evolving needs of distributors, manufacturers, and retailers in the cannabis industry. 🔗 Differentiation through Robust Integrations. Distru's focus on building highly robust, two-way integrations with key partners like Metrc, BioTrack, Leaflink, Dutchie, Blaze and Treez. This allows Distru to provide a true system of record for inventory and compliance across the supply chain. Blaine notes this attention to integration quality has been a key competitive advantage for Distru. 🚀📈Growth Strategy and Competitive Landscape. Distru's technical co-founding team and focus on building a cohesive, highly integrated product stand out as key differentiators vs competitors. Distru has been able to grow profitably with limited dilution, and Blaine sees significant continued opportunity (TAM) in the cannabis distribution and ERP market. 💰 Funding History and Future Plans. Distru started with a $30,000 angel check and then raised $3 million from Felicis and Global Founders and angel investors in 2019. Distru then went several years without raising additional funding, focusing instead on profitability and growth. Blaine sees Distru's strong financial position and limited dilution as advantages as the company looks to continue scaling. 🗺️ Product Roadmap and Expansion Plans. The company is launching new product features and expanding into additional states and countries. He sees significant untapped opportunity in the cannabis ERP market, with plans to build out more modules and solutions beyond the core ERP functionality. Distru is also open to strategic acquisitions that could further enhance its product offerings but is more focused on building products with its current team.

August 27, 202441 min

Long-term Cananbis RE Leases with NewLake Capital

Introduction to NewLake Capital Partners and Business Model. NewLake Capital Partners, a sale-leaseback REIT, is focused on the cannabis industry, owning 32 properties across 12 states.Jarrett Annenberg, SVP and Head of Investments at NewLake, explains that NewLake primarily purchases real estate from cannabis operators and leases it back to them, providing a capital infusion for the operators. The company owns a mix of dispensaries and cultivation facilities, emphasizing experienced operators in limited license states to mitigate risk and enhance property values. Comparison with Competitors and Strategic Approach. NewLake differs from mortgage REITs like Chicago Atlantic and AFC Gamma by directly owning real estate and offering long-term leases.Unlike its mortgage REIT counterparts, which typically focus on shorter-term, secured loans with real estate as collateral, NewLake adopts a long-term lease model, providing stability and predictability for both the company and its tenants. This approach allows NewLake to build deeper relationships with tenants and tailor their offerings to suit individual business needs. Focus on Limited License States and Experienced Operators. NewLake targets experienced operators in limited license states, which can provide a higher property value and lower vacancy risk.The company’s strategy focuses on areas where licenses are directly tied to properties, creating a moat around their investments. This approach ensures that in case of tenant turnover, the limited availability of licenses makes it easier to find replacement tenants, thus maintaining the property’s occupancy and value. Underwriting and Risk Management Practices. NewLake employs a conservative underwriting process that includes evaluating tenant management teams, financial health, state market dynamics, and alternative use values for properties.By focusing on these critical areas, NewLake ensures that their investments are aligned with long-term profitability. The company’s conservative approach is further supported by proprietary market research, allowing them to make informed investment decisions. They emphasize quality over quantity, choosing to partner only with operators who demonstrate solid financial performance and alignment with NewLake’s strategic objectives. Recent Transactions and Future Market Expansion. Recent transactions highlight NewLake’s cautious expansion, such as the C3 deal in Connecticut, while remaining open to new opportunities in states like New Jersey and Ohio.Annenberg discusses the company's conservative capital deployment strategy, including maintaining significant liquidity for opportunistic deals. Despite the challenging economic environment, NewLake remains selective, seeking to enter markets with strong growth potential and favorable regulatory frameworks. Their recent transaction in Connecticut reflects their approach to finding high-value deals even in smaller, overlooked markets. Jarrett Annenberg, Senior Vice President, Head of Investments. In addition to acquisitions, he assists in NewLake’s operations, portfolio management and capital raising efforts. Prior to founding NewLake, he spent ten years at CBRE where he was a Senior Vice President in CBRE’s Transactions and Advisory Services Group managing global real estate portfolios for high-growth companies. At the time of his promotion, he was CBRE’s youngest SVP outside of New York City, specializing in HQ transactions. During his tenure at CBRE, Mr. Annenberg worked on over seven million square feet of transactions with total value consideration in excess of $1 billion. Mr. Annenberg was a trusted advisor to fast growing companies such as GrubHub and Paylocity as well as established corporations like Caterpillar and AmTrust Financial. Mr. Annenberg received a B.S. from the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California with a concentration in real estate finance.

August 8, 20241 hr 8 min

30 Adult-Use States by EOY 2025?

We check in with Hirsh Jain on the Red Wave: MO ('22) → OH ('23) → FL ('24) → ND, SD, NE, AR ('25), Market growthrResumption with 30%+ market growth via OH, FL, PA, MN ($32B --> $44B), and 27 Adult-Use States by EOY 2024 and the possibility of 30 Adult-Use states by EOY 2025. Hirsh Jain is the Founder of Ananda Strategy, a strategy consultancy advising leading cannabis brands, retailers, technology businesses and venture capital funds across the United States, Canada and Western Europe. Ananda Strategy represents many of California’s leading cannabis retailers, helping lead their expansion strategy, competitive licensing efforts and M&A activity, and has helped open many of the top-performing dispensaries in the state. Ananda also serves operators in the Arizona, Colorado, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New York, Ohio, and Oregon markets, as well as operators in Canada and Western Europe.

April 24, 202446 min

Samson Extracts CEO Kyle Neathery

Kyle Neathery (Samson Extracts) is the CEO of Samson Extracts, an Alabama-owned and operated manufacturer of high-scale CBD extracts. Previously, Kyle served as the Director of Operations and General Manager for High Life Farms, a privately-held, family-owned cannabis company operating 150,000 square feet that includes an impressive portfolio of cultivation, manufacturing, distribution, in-house brands, brand partnerships with Wana Brands and Kiva Confections, white labeling solutions, and ownership stakes in retail dispensaries. High Life Farms has won multiple High Times Cannabis Cup awards for manufactured products and was featured on “Cannacribs” in late 2021. Kyle has extensive experience in manufacturing, process design and development, organization design and development, business turnarounds, process technology, supply chain, and metric development for businesses. Kyle also held previous positions as Senior Business Consultant at Southwest Airlines, a Senior Consultant for Oil & Gas and Aviation at PricewaterhouseCoopers, and a Program Founder of the Fraud, Waste, and Abuse Operation at the Deepwater Horizon Economic Class Action Settlement (BP Oil Spill). He has a Bachelor of Science degree in Finance from Louisiana Tech University and is Lean Six Sigma Certified from Villanova University.

April 19, 202448 min

CANNABIS XPRESS CEO Chris Jones

Chris founded Cannabis Xpress in 2018 after selling his previous cannabis retail chain, Star Buds Cannabis Cannabis. He has experience in Cannabis M&A and Distribution from his time at Origin House. Cannabis Xpress currently has 16 stores in Ontario and New Brunswick, focusing on smaller towns without other dispensaries present.

February 16, 202457 min

Motif Labs CEO Mario Naric

Mario Naric is the Founder & CEO of Motif Labs, a leading brand house in Canada’s including Boxhot (#1 vape brand in Canada), Rizzlers, DEBUNK and Boondocks. The company did C$90M of Revenue in 2013 and double-digit EBITDA.

February 9, 202446 min

The Bettering Company CEO Mark Cozzi

Mark is CEO and Co-Founder of The Bettering Company. Previously, he had a 35-year career in the finance sector, primarily focused on growth companies and startups. After spending 14 years on Wall Street in investment banking at Salomon Smith Barney / Citigroup Global Markets, he joined a client, Thomas Kaplan, as the first employee and co-founder of Leor Energy. He helped build Leor Energy into one of the fastest growing privately held energy companies, eventually being sold for $2.55 billion cash, turning Mr. Kaplan’s $22 million founder’s investment into a $2.2 billion exit. The Bettering Company (TBCo.) is a new luxury cannabis edibles brand offering chef-curated edibles that use real fruits, herbs, teas, spices, and jams and are consistently infused. Obsessed with precision, the company diligently focuses on production techniques that will result in consistent THC levels. TBCo.’s products are being made in a 10,000-square-foot facility designed state-of-the-art kitchen. The Bettering Company seeks to solve a historical problem in the cannabis sector of inconsistently infused edibles, leaving consumers with hesitancy to consume cannabis in edible form.

January 5, 202453 min

Metrc CEO Michael Johnson

Michael Johnson was appointed Metrc’s CEO in May 2022. He previously served as the company’s President and CFO from May 2021 to May 2022, where he was responsible for driving the company’s strategic and financial decisions. Prior to joining Metrc, Michael served as CFO at InformedDNA in St. Petersburg, Florida, and CM Group Global, in Nashville, Tennessee.

December 22, 202337 min

FloraWorks CEO Alleh Lindquist

FloraWorks is a discovery stage company developing a multifaceted approach to cannabinoid and cannabinoid-inspired drug development utilizing traditional chemical synthesis, advanced biological assays, and cutting-edge computational science to advance cannabinoid research for a new generation of therapeutics. Alleh Lindquist, CEO, FloraWorks. Prior to co-founding FloraWorks, Alleh was a CEO of Swell Companies, one of Oregon's largest cannabis extraction facilities, first to receive a license by the state and proprietor of two of Oregon's most notable vaporizer and cannabis oil brands. Alleh lead the company to a successful exit to C21 Investments in 2019. Prior to entering the Cannabis industry, Alleh worked as a commercial advertising photographer in the sports and lifestyle genre, for clients such as Nike, Polar, and Gerber Knives. Working as a photographer in advertising has given him a deep understanding of the value and path toward building a successful brand. https://flora-works.com/

December 12, 202342 min

urban-gro CEO Bradley Nattrass

urban-gro, Inc.® (Nasdaq: UGRO) is a fully integrated architectural, engineering, construction management, and cultivation systems integration company focused on delivering complete design-build solutions to the indoor CEA and Commercial sectors. With experience in hundreds of CEA facilities spanning millions of square feet across the globe, we design, specify, procure, engineer, and integrate complex environmental equipment systems into high-performance facilities. urban-gro’s gro-care® Managed Services Platform leverages the Company's expertise to reduce downtime, provide continuity, and drive facility optimization. Operating as a crop-agnostic solutions provider in both food and cannabis CEA sectors, our crop-focused end-to-end approach provides a single point of accountability across all aspects of growing operations. Visit urban-gro.com to discover how we help cultivators gro plants and gro profits. Bradley J. Nattrass has been CEO and Chairperson of the Board since March 2017. Bradley was a Managing Member from March 2014 until March 2017 when the Company converted to a corporation. From October 2015 to August 2016, he was the Managing Member of enviro-glo, LLC, a Colorado limited liability company engaged in the manufacturing and branding of commercial lighting products. Previously, from January 2012 through August 2016, he was the Managing Member of Bravo Lighting, LLC, a Colorado limited liability company engaged in the distribution of commercial lighting products.