We ask the industry to stop complaining and to start evolving into a saner, better version of themselves. We give specific advise on five different areas to improve.
Business
In many ways, major Cannabis companies are like pharmaceutical companies. They produce and sell products used for medicinal purposes, and their main pages have statements on how science is the most important thing in their work. We looked at 10 major pharmaceutical companies, and 10 major cannabis companies, and compared what positions they had for scientists, and their R&D spending. Unlike pharmaceutical companies, cannabis companies rarely have any scientists in the executive suites. Further, R&D spending from most of the cannabis companies we looked at was below 5% of their annual income (less than many agricultural companies), indicating these companies are not putting their money where their mouth is.
It turns out the percent total THC on your cannabis package is not accurate- in fact, you have a little more THC in your products than you thought. So, what does this mean for those in the hemp and cannabis industry?
In this op-ed, Dr. Roggen et al. propose a system for websites like Leafly that would allow its users to share revenue from their content and personal data, enabling a higher sense of trust, credibility and ultimately more value for every stakeholder involved. Using NFTs, they suggest consumers in the cannabis industry could generate a product and benefit from it too
In the beginning, a German Chemist wanted to start his own company. Dr. Markus roggen explains the genesis of DELIC Labs (formerly cbdv)
In an interview from the Emerald Conference 2020, Dr. Markus Roggen tells us about his slightly reluctant entry into the industry, the maddening inefficiencies in current extraction protocols, and his mission to put solid science at the heart of the industry.
