Tag Archives: cse issuer stories

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

BioHarvest Sciences: Revolutionizing the Health Industry With Botanical Synthesis

Imagine a world where we harness the power of plants to improve human wellness without harming the environment. Israeli biotech innovator BioHarvest Sciences (CSE:BHSC) is turning this vision into reality through its Bio-Plant CELLicitation plant cell technology, which is paving the way for a new era of sustainable and highly effective botanical compositions.

BioHarvest’s patented technology sets the company apart from traditional agriculture by producing botanical compositions without the need to grow the entire plant. These compositions are rich in primary and secondary metabolites such as proteins, phenolics, terpenes, steroids and alkaloids, which are of significant value to the nutrition and health industries. The botanical compositions produced through BioHarvest’s platform technology are highly bioavailable, consistent, pure, patentable and environmentally sustainable.

One of the company’s notable successes is its flagship product VINIA, a botanical composition derived from red grape cells that contains high levels of polyphenols, particularly piceid resveratrol.

VINIA has undergone multiple clinical trials and has proven to be effective for various therapeutic applications, having gained recognition for its ability to increase arterial dilation, improving blood flow throughout the body and supporting heart health, physical energy, mental alertness and cellular protection.

“The current global market for nutraceuticals is approximately US$160 billion and it is growing rapidly,” BioHarvest Sciences Chief Executive Officer Ilan Sobel tells Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine. “VINIA is uniquely positioned in this market because of its clinically proven efficacy and its successful track record with consumers over the last three years.”

Sobel says BioHarvest aims to achieve market share of at least 5% in the US cardiovascular and energy health segments within the next 36 months.

CELLicitation involves growing cells from different parts of the plant in liquid solutions inside large disposable bioreactors, and the platform has already been validated across multiple plant-derived compositions. The process allows BioHarvest to produce cells that contain the plant’s primary and secondary metabolites, known as phytochemicals, in a controlled and efficient manner.

And the company is building undeniable momentum. In 2022, BioHarvest reported revenue of US$5.5 million, a 179% increase from the previous year.

For 2023, BioHarvest anticipates revenue of $17 million to $20 million, which works out to around 300% growth compared to 2022. It also expects to break even at a cash operating level in the fourth quarter.

BioHarvest’s customer base is largely subscription based, and customer satisfaction is high, with a current rating of 4.8 out of 5 from over 2,200 reviews. The company plans to further expand its sales channels, including partnerships with major retailers such as Walmart.com, Amazon, and direct-to-doctor sales through integrative medicine specialists.

“We have announced the addition of 25,000 [direct-to-consumer] new customers in the last 12 months, and our current growth is limited only by our production capacity, which we are increasing significantly,” Sobel adds.

To support the anticipated growth, Sobel says the company’s newly designed production facility has annual production capacity of 20 tons, which is enough to meet its global operations plan for the next two years. The company is currently in the process of scaling up production to reach the maximum capacity.

Plans also call for building a larger facility with a capacity of 100 tons per year. To aid this expansion, BioHarvest recently hired Dr. Ilana Belzer as its first Chief Operating Officer to oversee manufacturing, including the development of new technologies to improve yield and reduce production costs.

Furthermore, the BioHarvest Sciences CEO says the company is diversifying its product channels by developing new formulations that incorporate VINIA into coffee, tea and protein bars. These are set to be available in late 2023 and early 2024.

BioHarvest is also looking to grow through other channels, particularly sports partnerships due to the obvious benefits its products can provide to athletes.

“Our recent partnership with Yo Murphy of the House of Athlete is an example of a unique program, where we just saw four of his ‘Team VINIA’ NFL prospects selected in the 2023 NFL draft,” Sobel says. “The partnership is a significant milestone for BioHarvest and demonstrates the potential of its innovative technology to revolutionize the sports nutrition industry.”

More partnerships and programs are in development, which includes VINIA being added to the NFL pre-season training regimens of over 140 players.

The company holds 15 approved patents covering its unique process and compositions. Additionally, the team’s accumulated know-how from 15 years of research and development further strengthens its position as a leader in the field.

“BioHarvest’s technology is poised to make a big difference in the health and wellness industry by availing patentable botanical compositions for therapeutic purposes that can be in the form of nutraceuticals and pharmaceuticals,” Sobel explains.

He says BioHarvest aims to lead the botanical synthesis revolution by utilizing the power of plants to improve human wellness while at the same time prioritizing environmental sustainability, which is evident in the company’s plans to leverage its expertise in research and development, manufacturing and commercialization.

BioHarvest is already working on expanding its product line to include additional products, with olive and pomegranate cell banks at the advanced development stage. A robust clinical trial program is underway, as the company tests product impact against specific medical indications. These clinical studies are designed to not only potentially augment the functional claims for different products but also to further the potential for those products to ultimately be included in pharmaceuticals, as either approved drugs or adjuncts to approved drugs.

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about BioHarvest Sciences at https://bioharvest.com/

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Railtown AI Technologies: Software Engineers Get a Co-Pilot to Help Navigate the Inevitable Turbulence of Development

Artificial intelligence is everywhere right now, and in the tech sector, thousands of entrepreneurs are looking for a way to plug AI into their business models.

The problem is that anyone who’s gone back and forth for more than a few minutes with a bot such as ChatGPT knows one thing: its responses are full of errors.

For AI to be truly useful, it needs to be trained effectively and have a defined purpose. Railtown AI Technologies (CSE:RAIL) has not one product but three designed for software developers that meet those criteria.

The company’s proprietary AI has been in stealth development for three years under the direction of Chief Executive Officer Cory Brandolini and Chief Technology Officer Marwan Haddad, a pair of self-described software geeks who became fast friends at a previous company and partnered up.

Their raison d’être is making it easier for developers to create new software and manage ongoing projects.

The first offering is Railtown’s Root Cause Analysis Co-Pilot, which is designed to detect bugs within applications and then quickly pinpoint the root cause of the errors and the impact on the application.

Right now, 40% of a software engineer’s time is, on average, spent identifying bugs and fixing them. It creates an enormous manpower challenge, according to Haddad. He and Brandolini once installed a fire engine light in the bullpen at their previous company that would go off whenever an issue arose. Senior engineers would drop everything to figure out what was wrong, at times taking hours to diagnose the root cause of the error and the impact it had on the application, resulting in delayed deliverables and pushing schedules behind.

Root Cause Analysis eliminates the mad dash to comb through every line of code. The Root Cause Analysis Co-Pilot hooks into the developer’s machine, where it spots errors before they reach production and immediately determines the root cause and ticket where the problem originated.

That’s why Brandolini says the company doesn’t design bots – it builds co-pilots.

“No matter how strong your team is technically, no matter how senior your developers are, when you’re building complex applications they are still fraught with functionality, logic and syntax issues,” he explains. “We’ve got it to the point today where AI can do a ton of the heavy lifting for you.”

The British Columbia-based company has also built an application to streamline the process of documenting product updates and enhancements, which are known in the industry as release notes.

Writing release notes takes an enormous amount of time for a team lead to produce, as they have to sift through dozens, if not hundreds, of completed work items to summarize and then write digestible release notes that can be consumed company wide. This is where Railtown’s Release Notes Co-Pilot comes in, as it is continually analyzing all new software deployments, as well as any changes made to software which will trigger the co-pilot to automatically generate comprehensive and accurate release notes. The net result is saving hours of developer downtime.

The Root Cause Analysis Co-Pilot and the Release Notes Co-Pilot are now available to over 400,000 Microsoft partners on the Microsoft Azure Marketplace and at Railtown’s website.

Then there’s Scrum Master, currently in the alpha stage of development, which could be Railtown’s crown jewel.

Scrum Master is a co-pilot in the truest sense of the word. Utilizing Railtown’s AI engine, the Scrum Master Co-Pilot can provide reason-based answers related to a wide range of topics including work items, deployment issues, build errors, bug fixes, performance issues and much more. Developers can ask the Co-Pilot specific questions or describe the problem that they are facing, and the Co-Pilot will provide relevant and actionable information to help solve the problem.

Brandolini calls Scrum Master a targeted language model, in contrast to large language models such as Open AI’s ChatGPT or Google’s Bard AI. Integrating Railtown’s proprietary AI into a development team’s builds, code changes and work items creates a more precise learning environment than any large learning mode could dream of.

“ChatGPT and Bard are trained off of what’s readily available and free, so any painting by Picasso or any book written by T.S. Eliot, they can train their machine on it. But they don’t have access to what goes on inside a company’s own specific applications,” Brandolini says.

“Because our AI is integrated with a company’s projects, our machine is now training on that data. Where Open AI’s is trained on the internet, our co-pilot understands exactly what you and your team are building and can answer questions in real time.”

It also keeps a developer’s data from being exposed to the broader internet, which means companies get the benefit of AI without exposing proprietary information to the prying eyes of Big Tech.

Scrum Master could even be used to onboard new engineers by delivering them detailed information on application features and answering any questions they might have.

That simply doesn’t exist in the market today, say Brandolini and Haddad, and it wouldn’t be as close as it is today if the two hadn’t become good friends.

“We were on a family holiday together in Whistler and sat down over a glass of wine. Marwan says, ‘I’ve got this idea,’” Brandolini explains. “I was like, ‘I’m in 100%.’ Life works that way by chance, but when both people have the common drive and our goals are the same, then it’s an instant connection.”

The plan is to release Scrum Master in the next quarter.

“Version one was like a child in elementary school. Now, version six or seven is like a university professor,” Brandolini exclaims. “It went from learning how to understand what a bug is to where it’s now using knowledge and reason to generate answers. Ask any developer if they would like this running for their team and the answer will be 100% yes.”

To help make that a reality, Railtown plans to ramp up spending on market awareness and user acquisition starting in June. The company expects a significant increase in paying customers and revenue growth over the next two to three quarters.

“This is not a bubble; this is just the beginning of the AI generation,” concludes Brandolini. “Artificial intelligence is having, and is going to continue to have, a profound and positive impact across all of our lives and across every business. The question investors should be asking themselves and asking their financial advisors is ‘what is my AI investment strategy’?”

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Railtown AI Technologies at https://www.railtown.ai/

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Li-FT Power: Explorers Will Race to Find Lithium Over the Next Decade, and Li-FT Intends to Lead the Field

A swath of land lies nestled in the Northwest Territories, not far from the capital city of Yellowknife, where hard rock lithium pegmatites literally stick out of the ground. They’ve been there for a long time, but few people had reason to take notice.

Now known as the Yellowknife Lithium Project, the site was acquired by Li-FT Power (CSE:LIFT) in November of this year. Covering 14 mineral leases that host numerous spodumene-bearing pegmatite, the area was held privately for 35 years.

Sufficient exploration was conducted to demonstrate the world-class lithium resource potential of the dyke systems on the leases. However, the properties lay dormant because lithium had yet to become the vital commodity it is today. 

That’s about to change.

Li-FT Chief Executive Officer Francis MacDonald believes the lithium market is entering a window of unprecedented potential to generate returns on investment. Lithium-ion batteries are powering a technology revolution that will leave the carbon economy behind. A supply crunch has driven up prices. 

That has created plenty of jockeying for territory, plus a race to reach production before supply catches up to demand. 

“The world needs more lithium,” MacDonald states plainly. “Lithium is not especially rare; it’s just that the transition to electric mobility supporting the fight against climate change drastically increased demand for lithium-ion batteries. So, one of the key things now is getting projects into production quickly.”

Li-FT is working with the Indigenous communities in the area to do just that. The company is currently in the initial permitting and engagement phase, and once that is complete, the intention is to conduct a substantial drill program as soon as possible to confirm the world-class resource potential is valid. 

If things go to plan, drilling under the lithium pegmatites on the surface would deliver enough data to put out an inferred resource estimate after just one pass, likely in the first half of 2024. 

When the dust settles, this could be one of the largest lithium deposits in North America if what’s visible on the surface goes down to depth at 300 metres, MacDonald says. 

The last company to work on the area was Equinox Resources, one of billionaire mining entrepreneur Ross Beaty’s companies. Equinox was acquired in 1993 by Hecla Mining, which was focused on gold exploration, not lithium.

“This was the early nineties. Lithium was used for ceramics and very special niche markets. No one cared about lithium,” MacDonald explains. “After the acquisition of Equinox, Hecla didn’t have any interest in advancing lithium projects, so they just reverted back to the private company.”

Prior to Li-FT, which named him CEO before making the Yellowknife acquisition, MacDonald spent the earlier part of his career as an exploration geologist with Newmont Mining working in the Canadian Arctic and Africa. In 2016, he co-founded Kenorland Minerals, a North American greenfield exploration company.

Most of his previous work was in gold, but in recent years, MacDonald has been drawn to lithium projects. In addition to the metal’s rise in value, lithium projects are quicker to reach the feasibility stage, he says. 

For example, a 2 million ounce gold project can require between 500,000 and 1.5 million metres of drilling to reach feasibility. That’s a lot of money and a great deal of time. 

Lithium pegmatites, by contrast, need as little as 15,000 metres to reach feasibility, which in turn means a much more attractive return on exploration dollars. 

The reason, MacDonald says, is hard rock lithium’s high grade and structural continuity. In other words, you don’t need to drill as much to be confident about what’s beneath the surface.

“These pegmatites, they’re cracks that go for two kilometres, and they’re just consistently 20 or 30 metres wide,” he says. “The structural geometry is a lot more continuous, and the grade is more homogenous as well.” 

Other projects just aren’t like that. A vein of quartz, for example, could pinch out and be much shorter than anticipated. To get the same level of confidence requires a lot more drilling. 

The value of lithium, the amount a given company is sitting on and the speed with which projects can reach feasibility are going to define the sector over the next decade. Li-FT is in a race, and MacDonald likes its chances.

“Everyone’s asking for lithium properties now,” he says. “And at some point in the future – 2030, 2035 – supply is going to satisfy or even exceed demand.”

In the meantime, Li-FT is getting its permits in order. That starts with showing the local Indigenous communities that this project will bring economic benefits to the region. 

Communication is key, and MacDonald doesn’t take that lightly. 

“This is traditional land,” he says. “And who am I? I’m a guy from Nova Scotia who lives in Munich saying, ‘I want to drill something in your backyard.’ I always think: if someone came up to my parents in Nova Scotia, and they didn’t sit down, have a cup of tea with them and explain what they were proposing, my parents would be pretty annoyed.”

Listening to what has worked, and what hasn’t, with past mining projects helps create a win-win for everyone. Plus, if the experience is positive, that makes the next project easier to get off the ground. 

Eventually, if some of the pegmatites go toward a positive feasibility study and eventually into production, that’s when an impact and benefits agreement could come into play, MacDonald says, helping the affected First Nations communities.

In addition to Yellowknife, Li-FT controls a combined 228,237 hectares of ground across a trio of greenfield lithium pegmatite projects in Québec: Rupert, Pontax and Moyenne. Those projects are prospective for lithium pegmatite too, but it’s a totally different strategy and will play out over time.

But at Yellowknife, the lithium is actually sticking out of the ground. Someone just needs to take a drill to it and define the extent of what is there.

“It’s one of the most interesting exploration opportunities out there right now because it sat in a private company for 35 years for the right group and the right time,” MacDonald concludes. “We just need to show what is below the surface.”

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Li-FT Power at li-ft.com. 

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Irving Resources: As Japan Opens Back Up, so Do This Successful Explorer’s Chances to Find More High-Grade Gold and Silver

A softer Japanese economy, technological advancements, more favourable government policies and a shift in the local attitude toward mining mean it has never been a better time to explore and develop in Japan, according to Vancouver-based junior gold explorer Irving Resources (CSE:IRV).

Formed as a spin-out in a 2015 plan of arrangement between Gold Canyon Resources and First Mining Finance, Irving’s Co-Founders, Akiko Levinson and Dr. Quinton Hennigh, created the company with a focus on exploration in Japan.

Levinson, who is also Irving’s President and Chief Executive Officer, has more than 25 years of experience in the junior mining industry, previously serving as President of Gold Canyon Resources.

Hennigh, an economic geologist with more than 25 years of exploration experience with major gold mining firms, is Irving’s Technical Advisor.

They have attracted notable shareholders to Irving, including Newmont, the company’s largest investor, holding a stake of just under 20%, and Sumitomo Corporation, which holds about 5%. 

Through subsidiary Irving Resources Japan GK, Irving has been operating in Japan for six years with a growing portfolio of 100% owned projects located across the islands.

According to Levinson, who is Japanese, the company is not seen as foreign. 

“Most of our team members are Japanese or foreigners who reside in Japan,” Levinson says, adding that having an understanding of the Japanese language and culture gives Irving an advantage while operating in the country. 

Irving’s focus is on high-silica, high-grade epithermal gold and silver veins, with such ore suitable for smelter flux in one of the many existing base metal smelters in Japan. Precious metals such as gold and silver are recovered during the smelting and refining process. 

Hennigh told Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine that this is a simple, cost-effective and environmentally friendly way to produce gold and silver, as it does not require significant capital investment and generates very little surface waste. 

“You simply identify deposits that have a high silica content along with appreciable gold and silver that are suited for smelter flux,” says Hennigh. “It’s an absolutely elegant model for developing gold mines.” 

Irving’s flagship project, Omu, is located in an epithermal vein district on Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido. Exploration to date has focused on three targets: Omui, Hokuryu and Omu Sinter.

“We have completed drilling on all of those targets, in some cases multiple drill programs, and we think we have substantial discoveries of high-grade gold and silver veins,” Hennigh notes. “We’re seeing potentially economic deposits at all three targets.” 

Another main project is Yamagano, which encompasses the past-producing Yamagano Gold Mine, where mining dates back about 400 years. The site has never been explored using modern methods.

Acquired in September 2020, Yamagano is located 11 kilometres southwest of Sumitomo Metal Mining’s Hishikari Gold Mine, which Hennigh points out has produced about 8 million ounces of gold and is one of the highest grade gold mines in the world. “We think Yamagano is a very close analog that could have similar potential,” he explains. 

Hennigh also highlighted a group of tenements that the company has recently applied for on the Noto Peninsula. Totalling 337 square kilometres with four target areas, the tenements have displayed strong stream sediment gold, silver, arsenic, antimony, mercury and gold anomalism.

“We have identified several areas where there are very clear gold anomalies that have no historical record,” he says. “In other words, there could be substantial epithermal vein occurrences that are yet to be recognized.” 

Influencing Hennigh’s and Levinson’s decision to focus their exploration efforts on Japan was a perfect alignment of factors. 

A softening Japanese economy has made exploration and mining cheaper in the country, just as the sensitivity around mining has diminished with past problem projects now cleaned up and remediated. Meanwhile, revamped mining laws have made it more feasible for exploration in Japan.

“With Japan’s demographic shift, its aging population, many of these small towns in rural areas would fade away, so they welcome that we bring economic life to their town,” Hennigh says.

On the geology side, Hennigh highlights advancements in the understanding of epithermal gold systems in recent years as another factor. “That bodes well for discovering new blind deposits that were not well recognized previously.” 

For Irving, working in Japan is all about building relationships and trust. The company has made an effort to build relationships with every stakeholder it works with, from local farmers to major players in the mining sector. 

“Akiko has gotten to know and sat down and had tea with many of the farmers in the area,” Hennigh explains. “She knows the mayor of the area where our flagship Omu project is quite well. We see these as important relationships to build to make everyone comfortable about the changes and opportunities within mining.” 

At a higher level, the company has built strong relationships with Japan’s old mining houses and with government agencies such as the Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC), an organization administered by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan responsible for the stable supply of various resources.

“These groups that we’ve connected with are part of the overall system that is going to be required to make new mines happen in Japan,” Hennigh says.

In 2023, Irving plans to accelerate exploration across its portfolio by adding a third drill rig after being handcuffed by pandemic-related travel and other restrictions for the past three years. 

It is building up its roster of staff to operate the drills, including expats from foreign countries and Japanese drillers.

According to Hennigh, Irving expects to drill three promising targets at its flagship Omu project and commence testing of a new target at the project, Maruyama, which has returned silica-rich surface samples with good values of gold and silver. 

At its Yamagano project, Irving has been carrying out geophysical work in preparation for a drill program to commence in the latter half of 2023. 

Hennigh says the addition of a third drill rig is a major milestone for the company because it will allow Irving to carry out two concurrent drill programs: one in Hokkaido at its Omu project and one in Kyushu at its Yamagano project. 

“By the end of 2023, I expect to operate three drills on a routine basis in Japan once we’ve got all our people in place,” Hennigh concludes. “This is a big step that dramatically accelerates our drilling and our ability to test targets.”

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Irving Resources at irvresources.com. 

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Relevant Gold: Mapping Out a New District With Concepts 2.65 Billion Years in the Making

Relevant Gold (CSE:RGC) is a new company on the CSE with a bold idea.

Built by serial entrepreneurs with a track record of success in the exploration space, Relevant is casting “new eyes on old rocks,” as Chief Executive Officer Rob Bergmann likes to say.

And it has come up with a big hypothesis: shear-hosted gold mineralization throughout Wyoming is connected to the prolific Abitibi shear zone belts in Ontario and Québec, making the state the potential site of a new gold rush. The Abitibi is one of the world’s premier gold districts, with over 230 million ounces of gold produced over the last 100 years and more being uncovered throughout the belt.

Relevant Gold’s interpretation of geological records comes straight from science. Dr. Kevin Chamberlain is a researcher at the University of Wyoming and one of several technical advisors to the company. He has also authored publications on the tectonic reconstruction of the region and helped propel the structural thesis to the forefront, connecting the structure to the actual Superior Province, a crustal block stretching from Ontario and Québec to northern Minnesota, during its critical development window.

Relevant Gold’s other technical advisors include Dr. Tom Campbell, who spent his entire career working in orogenic shear-hosted gold systems, both at the Homestake Mine as well as in the Abitibi, and Dr. Dean Peterson, who did his PhD research on the Abitibi, specifically looking at the gold produced in the Timmins, Kirkland Lake and Hemlo camps.

The technical team hypothesizes that the gold deposits of the Abitibi formed around 2.65 billion years ago across the Abitibi province, or craton, and the Wyoming province. The two cratons started to drift apart around 2.1 billion years ago to come to rest beneath what is now the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Québec. Half a billion years later, major tectonic drifting occurred that moved those geologic provinces and plates apart to where they sit now.

Essentially, if the Wyoming craton was attached to the Abitibi, then the gold and the deformation happened in both provinces. Relevant Gold’s team of experts believes that its own reconnaissance is beginning to prove the model through extensive exploration in the state.

Bergmann told Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine that the team was “standing on the shoulders of giants” in connecting the dots to form its theory, building upon existing literature published by leading educators.

“We’re pioneering this idea from an economic level in today’s environment,” Bergmann explains. “There have been multiple papers published on the theory of these connections, but the science itself hasn’t been around for that long. One of our key advantages is that it is a relatively young science. A lot of it came from modern technologies that allow scientists to age-date the rocks more accurately, connect those in time and do that full reconstruction.”

Wyoming is not exactly unknown in a mining context. In 2020, the state was rated as having the second-most friendly mining policies globally by the Fraser Institute, so projects face lower social and environmental risk. As the least populated state in the country, Wyoming was founded on resource development, and permitting is about as streamlined as it gets. But it is other resources – bentonite, coal, rare earths and uranium – that dominate the state’s mining matrix; gold, less so. 

That said, Relevant Gold is one of a handful of companies zeroing in on Wyoming’s resources. Nasdaq-listed US Gold is looking to put its CK gold project into development, and other companies are starting to ramp up exploration activities.

Relevant Gold, however, is at the forefront of pioneering the Abitibi comparisons, which gives them a lot of room for exploration. In Relevant Gold’s case, that would mean searching for an orogenic-style gold deposit similar to the massive Timmins, Canadian Malartic or Hemlo operations in the Abitibi.

“When we set out to build the portfolio, we took a look at the criteria needed for an Abitibi-like system, and we narrowed in on district-scale opportunities,” Bergmann says. “Each one of our five properties that we’ve assembled is large enough to host a deposit of that scale, as well as the potential development footprint.” 

Relevant assembled five district-scale assets totalling over 40,000 acres of ground, including the current flagships, Golden Buffalo and Lewiston. While both projects are at the earliest stages of development, Bergmann and the team see “a lot of catalysts” in the near and longer terms.

“As a geologist at heart, it is exciting because this stuff has never been drilled, and the thesis is very new,” says Bergmann. “For example, we just completed our inaugural drill program at one of our projects, the Golden Buffalo project. We are the first ones to ever see those rocks at the subsurface, which is pretty exciting.”

Golden Buffalo has “an abundance” of high-grade visible gold at surface, according to Bergmann. The focus of the inaugural drill program is to define the geology and the structural architecture in the subsurface. As Bergmann explains, in the Abitibi, it can take on average around 70 to 100 drill holes before making a discovery. Usually, companies going into a drill program already have an abundance of knowledge of the subsurface. That’s where Relevant differs. 

“We went in and didn’t have any of that knowledge, but we were still able to complete 26 holes and about 3,500 metres in the inaugural program,” says Bergmann. “Ultimately, our main goal is to define the subsurface geology and the architecture and understand if this is truly a big orogenic system, meaning do these shear zones extend at depth into the subsurface and along strike? Is there fluid evolution related to that?”

From there, Relevant will start vectoring toward a gold deposit opportunity of scale. “We know that we’ve got a lot of gold at surface and that the system’s enriched, but we really need to confirm that the system is there at a scalable size,” Bergmann explains. “That would really help position us to continue to go at Golden Buffalo and also help guide our drilling on Lewiston and our other high-value targets.”

All told, Relevant Gold has assembled a very knowledgeable board with a management group and technical team that can carry out its plans efficiently and cost-effectively, a fact Bergmann stresses is important in today’s market. 

“Investors are looking at the markets a little bit differently, and rightfully so,” Bergmann says. “I’d like to think that at Relevant Gold, we are one of these juniors that is very well positioned in these current markets, which not a lot of folks can say. We’re a very clean company with a clean share structure and a long runway of opportunities and targets. We’ve been able to sustain some value in the marketplace, and with strong support and shareholders that are with us for the long term, we really believe in the team and our ability to create value.”

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Relevant Gold at relevantgoldcorp.com. 

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Western Uranium & Vanadium: Sights Set on Becoming a Global Leader in Low-Cost Production of Uranium and Vanadium

Nuclear energy is positioned as a key component in the worldwide push to reduce carbon emissions. Nuclear reactors, after all, generate power through heat released by fission, which is used to create steam that spins a turbine to generate electricity without the harmful emissions associated with fossil fuels.

Uranium demand to fuel the world’s nuclear reactors is expected to rise to 79,400 metric tonnes of elemental uranium (MTU) by 2030, up from 62,500 MTU in 2021, with that number anticipated to climb to 112,300 MTU in 2040, according to a report by the World Nuclear Association.

Colorado-based Western Uranium & Vanadium (CSE:WUC) is a mining company focused on low-cost, near-term production of uranium and vanadium in the western United States. The company has a large production-ready, permitted and developed high-grade uranium and vanadium resource, which includes the Sunday Mine Complex developed by Union Carbide for almost US$50 million in the 1970s.

Chief Executive Officer George Glasier has a record of uranium mining success, having founded Energy Fuels, which is currently the largest uranium and vanadium resource holder in the US. On a recent call with Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine, Glasier discussed Western Uranium & Vanadium’s goal of becoming a low-cost uranium and vanadium producer, as well as why now could be a good time for investors to consider companies in the space.

Tell us about why you were motivated to form Western Uranium & Vanadium.

The motivation was the expected increase in the price of uranium and vanadium. I’ve been in that industry for years, having previously formed Energy Fuels, and I was also involved with the original company called Energy Fuels Nuclear back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, which became the largest uranium producer in the US. 

When the industry was in bad shape and commodity prices were low, there was no reason to consider being in the uranium mining business. But as prices looked like they were going to rebound, we formed Western Uranium & Vanadium in 2014 to buy a key asset package from Energy Fuels.

So, my motivation was to take advantage of these incredible properties that we could acquire at a reasonable price for the expected uranium boom and get back into the uranium business with a profitable company.

Why might now be a good time for investors to consider uranium and vanadium stocks?

Well, because I don’t think we’ve reached the peak, and the CEO of Bannerman Energy just said we need an $80 per pound uranium price around the world to produce the supplies needed to keep reactors operating.

Let’s say we’re at a spot price of around $50 and maybe we’re at a term price of $60. But to incentivize additional production, we need an $80 uranium price. And at $80 there are a number of companies that stand to make quite a bit of money, including the explorers over the longer term. If an investor wants to get into a commodity, there’s probably not a better commodity right now than uranium with the expected price increase.

Our company is a dual producer of uranium and vanadium, which is very unusual, as most uranium companies don’t have vanadium. And vanadium, which had been used primarily as an alloy for steel, is now being used in vanadium redox flow batteries for stationary energy storage. This should provide a real boost to the demand for vanadium around the world and ultimately increase the value of vanadium.

I think that investing in a company that has both uranium and vanadium as commodities could be a double win, as both seem set to increase in value over the next five years.

Your company has stated that production will be restarting soon at the Sunday Mine Complex. What is required to begin operations there?

The process has begun. In fact, we just hired two new people this week, and we’re hiring the rest of the crew who will be on board after the first of the year. And we’ve already got all the equipment we need for the first stages of production.

The mine was in production as recently as 2022, but the mining contractor wanted to shut down for various reasons, mostly due to his health. So, we did that and began buying mining equipment, starting with his. We thus have very little to do to get started — just really hire some more employees. The mine is fully permitted, developed and ready to go, and we will be back at that mine in January with our production crews.

In May, you announced revenue from a uranium concentrate supply agreement. Are there any other near-term revenue opportunities for the company?

We own oil and gas royalties that generate revenue of up to $50,000 a month, and the operator just drilled additional wells to bring into production. It’s a revenue stream that we have, and it’s kind of unique for a uranium and vanadium company. And while the revenue it generates is not insignificant, it won’t be a value creator for our company.  

Do you plan on adding more oil and gas royalties? 

No, this just happens to be a uranium property we acquired with additional minerals. We’re not an oil and gas company, and we’re not a royalty company. But we had the assets, so we took advantage of that by leasing it to an oil company, and they drilled these wells in the oil and gas fields of northern Colorado.

We don’t intend to acquire more oil and gas royalties. We’re a uranium and vanadium producer, and we do that well. That being said, we could go on collecting these royalties for another 20 or 30 years. 

What do your shareholders have to look forward to in the next 12 months?

We recently came out with some big news that really sets the stage for everything else this year. After many months of assessing locations, we found the perfect site for building the processing plant that will handle ore from the Sunday Mine Complex and ore from our other projects, as well as feed from other conventional miners.

So, it’s great as a team to have acquired land parcels in Utah for the facility, and now we’ll be going all out to get it into mill production as fast as reasonably possible.

Permitting is our focus right now, and we are targeting 2026 for initial mill production. At start-up, the plan is to produce 2 million pounds of uranium per year and 5 million to 6 million pounds of vanadium.  A cobalt circuit will be designed and constructed if there is enough interest from nearby companies who have cobalt ore.

I’d also highlight that in addition to substantial production coming out of the Sunday Mine, we will be expanding extraction into each of the five mines comprising the broader Sunday Complex. It’s reasonable to anticipate two or three crews working at the complex by the end of 2023. We’ll be stockpiling ore there so that we’re ready to provide consistent feed to the processing facility.

Is there anything else that you want prospective investors to know about your company?

We believe this industry has a real future. We’re a small company, we’re well-staffed with good people and we’ve got great resources. If you look at our resource base, it may not all be NI-43-101 compliant, but we carry over 50 million pounds of historical resources based upon limited drilling. And our resource base with high-grade uranium and vanadium is probably going to be some of the lowest-cost production in North America, if not the world.

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Western Uranium & Vanadium at western-uranium.com.

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

TANTALEX LITHIUM RESOURCES: ENJOYING “BEST OF ALL WORLDS” AS TWO PROJECTS MOVE TOWARD PRODUCTION AND INITIAL DRILLING BEGINS IN LARGE LITHIUM CORRIDOR

Lithium is all the rage these days and for good reason, with the world going increasingly electric and viable sources of near-term lithium supply insufficient to meet projected demand. There are plenty of lithium exploration projects on the go, yet grade, location and other factors suggest few will go into production anytime soon.

Tantalex Lithium Resources (CSE:TTX) is in the enviable position of having a tin and tantalum project readying for production in Q1 2023, a lithium project heading for production by 2025 and a huge lithium pegmatite exploration project soon to see its first drilling ever. And expectations for the pegmatite project are high, sitting, as it does, near one of the world’s largest undeveloped hard rock lithium resources.

Tantalex President and Chief Executive Officer Eric Allard is a veteran of mining in Africa and knows well the country in which his team operates, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, or DRC. In a recent interview with Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine, Allard discussed working in the DRC and outlined timelines to production and exploration for the company’s projects.

Tantalex has three projects that collectively involve lithium, tantalum and tin. All are in the DRC and two are progressing toward production. Tell us about your experience in the DRC and the various aspects of working there.

The DRC is a very mining-focused country, so the procedures, regulations and administration for mining companies are clear. There is a mining code, a mining law and many mining companies operate there: Barrick is one, Glencore, Trafigura, ERG.  They focus mainly on copper and cobalt.

The DRC is a very favourable jurisdiction in that regard. The challenge is administration. Because mines in the DRC are so rich, and mining represents such a large portion of the government’s annual revenue, they don’t so much see the difference between junior exploration companies and producing companies. Moving forward as a publicly listed junior mining company can be challenging in the DRC because they are used to overseeing producing companies, and it is a different mindset.

Looked at another way, the DRC resources are so rich that they do not really look for investors either. Investors come to them.

We are fortunate because the DRC has stated that it is very interested in developing the electric vehicle battery metals space, lithium being one of the big elements. The biggest hard rock undeveloped resource was discovered a few years ago in the Manono area: 400 million tonnes at 1.65% Li2O, which is one of the most incredible LCT (lithium-cesium-tantalum) pegmatites ever. And that’s in the region where we are.

Because we are operating tailings reclamation projects, our speed to market and ability to bring our projects to production is a big advantage. Seeing as we will likely be the first lithium producer in the DRC, we are getting a lot of support from the government.

What about obtaining permits and finding skilled workers?

There are no surprises as you go along. As long as you follow the procedures, the government will act upon them. As an example, we recently obtained a mining permit for our TiTan tin and tantalum project.

As far as human resources, Manono is a fairly remote area, but because the DRC is a mining country, there are a lot of very qualified technicians, engineers and tradespeople available. That’s a big advantage compared to many other mining jurisdictions around the world that are suffering from serious labour shortages.

You just mentioned receiving permits for TiTan.  What comes next?

We had to work with the government on getting a better road to reach the project, and that is almost complete. We will be pouring the concrete foundations in December. It is a $10 million investment, and we anticipate two to three months for construction. Commissioning is scheduled for March, and the start of production shortly thereafter.

Can you walk us through TiTan’s economics and what this does for the company’s financials?

Production is planned to be 120 tonnes of tin concentrate per month and 20 tonnes of tantalum concentrate per month with a plant capacity throughput of 130 tonnes per hour.

On average, we are looking at about US$2.5 million to $3 million of revenue per month at today’s commodity prices, which would generate around $1 million to $1.5 million per month in net cash flow. The objective is to use it for the development of our other projects and also phase two and three of TiTan.

Talk to us now about the Manono Tailings project and the pegmatite corridor. Looking at maps of the projects, they seem to sit in a line.

They do, and that is a big advantage because our team can be working simultaneously on all three projects. The TiTan project is 40 kilometres southwest of the Manono Tailings project, so it’s all in close proximity.

Our flagship is really the Manono Tailings project. It comes from an old tin mine that operated from 1913 to the 1980s. The mine focused on tin and tantalum and never exploited the lithium. We bought into the tailings licence in 2018, and there are 11 dumps and processed tailings terraces. We conducted a drone topographic survey of the entire concession area and confirmed 105 million tonnes of material on surface.

A year and a half ago we identified where we would start drilling, targeting dumps with a higher presence of pegmatite, and we drilled on about half of the total dumps. We identified from our 13,000 metres of drilling a very interesting resource in the southwest portion.

We released the maiden resource for the Manono Tailings project on December 15 of this year, with 12.09 million tonnes at an average grade of 0.64% Li2O and a little under half already in the Measured and Indicated category. This allows us to proceed immediately with our phase one project to produce about 100,000 tonnes of spodumene concentrate per year at 6% Li2O (SC6) for an initial mine life of six to eight years. 

With SC6 lithium concentrate foreseeably selling above US$4,000 per tonne for the next six to eight years and extremely low mining costs, you can see why we are so excited.

We are aiming to be in production by 2025.

And the pegmatite corridor is pure exploration at this point, is that correct?

Yes, our focus is to get the Manono Tailings project into production as soon as possible and take advantage of the supply shortage in the lithium space to generate substantial revenue for the company. We have already initiated a feasibility study and environmental and social impact studies, and we are targeting the completion of the feasibility study by June 2023. A PEA (Preliminary Economic Assessment) will likely be issued in March.

The pegmatite corridor is the blue sky potential. It is a 25 kilometre corridor immediately adjacent and down strike to the 400 million tonne 1.65% Li2O hard rock resource I mentioned earlier. All geology indicates the pegmatites that formed the historical mine extend to the southwest onto our properties. There are showings on surface of the pegmatites, but the corridor on our properties has never been drilled. We actually just started drilling there. 

Let’s look beyond just mining for a moment. Tantalex supports community efforts in the DRC. What can you tell us about these and your motivation for being involved?

It’s a win-win. We are in partnership with the government with these efforts. The government relies on us to help NGOs and local populations, and by us doing so, it brings everyone closer.

It’s a case of becoming a citizen of the country. We are not there just to prove up a resource. The ultimate goal is sustainability.  And to have a sustainable operation when we plan to be in the DRC for the long term, we have to work with the community and help people as much as we can, and they will help us in return. That’s what we are doing right now, and it is wonderful to see.

This latest medical campaign that we’ve supported, involving an NGO called Upright Africa, is just fantastic. It involved medical teams coming in and providing health care. Founder John Woods is a retired US doctor and has been in and out of Africa for the past 10 years, in war zones and lots of situations.

The Manono area was a thriving mining community for 80 years, and when the mine stopped so did everything else. Manono was forgotten by the rest of the world, but because there is more mining now, there is more hope. Doctors came in, and they were able to inaugurate a new hospital and get operations going.

To see this happening not only helps people who are ill but gives hope to others. That’s what they need – they need to feel that somebody is there to help them out. The mortality rate for children under 12 is close to 40%. And they are dying from things that don’t make sense in 2022.

You are based in Canada, but the projects require a lot of expertise on the ground, and I see you had metallurgical work done in South Africa. Talk to us about operating advanced projects overseas.

I’ve spent most of my career on the ground, and our team is also very experienced in Africa. Most of the members of our board have worked or are still working in Africa. We have a team of about 100 in the DRC, so we have surrounded ourselves with experienced managers, operators and workers. For us, it is nothing new. It is just our normal area of work. It is very remote, and there are always the challenges of Africa, but it is our experience that enables us to operate there effectively.

Is there anything we have missed?

To summarize, we are a company which is a near-term cash flow producer for three extremely strategic commodities: lithium, tin and tantalum, and also one with blue sky potential for much more discovery on our additional 1,200 square kilometres of exploration concessions around Manono. I think we have great assets and great people, and the timing could not be better for us. It is the best of all worlds.

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Tantalex Lithium Resources at tantalexlithium.com. 

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

InnoCan Pharma: Combining Cannabinoids and Cutting-Edge Science to Deliver Drugs on Target

Smart drug delivery systems that deliver medications to specific sites in the human body are on the leading edge of science.

This type of biomedical engineering focuses on maximizing drug efficiency and minimizing possible side effects, while reducing the overall amount of medication used and frequency of treatment.

Cannabinoids play a crucial role in regulating the immune system and have been shown to suppress inflammation through multiple anti-inflammatory pathways. Their high safety profile makes them an appealing alternative to many traditional drugs, according to Iris Bincovich, Chief Executive Officer of InnoCan Pharma (CSE:INNO). 

InnoCan is working to harness the unique qualities of cannabinoids and combine them with the latest in drug delivery systems. The goal is to deliver cannabinoids such as CBD so that more of it becomes available for the body to benefit from than with current platforms.

Bincovich recently spoke with Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine about working with university researchers on the combination of cannabinoids and innovative delivery systems, as well as the direction in which the company’s technologies are heading.

InnoCan recently reported the results of preclinical trials on dogs, using injections for both pain relief from osteoarthritis and for the treatment of epilepsy. What did you learn from these trials?

We learned that we can bring a substantially better bioavailability of CBD to the bloodstream.

The low oral bioavailability of CBD in people, at 6.5% to 20% of administered dosage, is a result of first pass metabolism in the liver and considered to be variable and dependent on fasting and fed conditions.

Together with The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, we’re developing injectable liposomal CBD formulations (LPT) that have already shown higher bioavailability of CBD and prolonged release to the bloodstream.

In a recent study, we’ve learned that the LPT showed close to 100% bioavailability of CBD and prolonged release for at least four weeks after one LPT subcutaneous injection.

In this preclinical trial, a dog with drug-resistant epilepsy was treated with InnoCan Pharma’s LPT injections. The results demonstrated that the frequency and intensity of the dog’s epileptic seizures decreased significantly. Since the last LPT injection, the dog has not had a seizure for over 10 weeks.

In another preclinical trial, six dogs suffering from osteoarthritis and treated with oral analgesics, but still experiencing pain, were administered a single LPT subcutaneous injection in addition to their routine analgesics. CBD concentrations were observed for six weeks following the liposomal CBD injection in the dogs’ plasma. Owners reported that the dogs’ pain and wellbeing scores improved for several weeks after the injection. The results show that the LPT technology has the potential to provide additional analgesia in dogs suffering from pain.

You’re starting by treating dogs for these conditions, and eventually moving on to the human side?

We’re gathering data for this purpose. We chose a big animal model for developing a drug and a treatment model. And yes, the veterinary industry is a potential market whereas the regulatory barriers are marked for the human pharma side.

In both pathways, veterinary and human, we see a lot of potential for the LPT technology to improve patients’ quality of life.

CBD-loaded exosomes (CLX) may hold the potential to regenerate cells. Could this work for conditions associated with the central nervous system?

Exosomes are small particles created when stem cells are multiplied. Lately, they are considered a very promising delivery platform for different molecules. The exosomes can be used as a delivery vehicle that can deliver cannabinoids to diverse target sites in the body.

Various cannabinoids were shown to protect neuronal cell death following their exposure to various oxidative stress damages.

We’re collaborating with Ramot at Tel Aviv University to develop a revolutionary cannabinoid-loaded exosome technology that may hold the potential to provide a highly synergistic therapeutic effect. This effect utilizes the regenerative and anti-inflammatory properties of exosomes and cannabinoids to target various conditions associated with the central nervous system.

What’s next for InnoCan?

The LPT platform development is now in the stage of collecting more safety and efficacy information, with a view toward human clinical trials.

From Q4 2022 going into 2023, we will commence targeting pharma veterinary companies, especially in the companion animal arena for pain management and epilepsy drugs, to initiate negotiation of licensing agreements.

In the three years since we went public, we’ve done an early exercise of warrants. Nearly 90% of our investors chose to exercise the warrants for total proceeds of C$9.2 million. We’re collaborating with leading scientific institutes, focusing on the development of the LPT and CLX drug delivery systems, to achieve our goals of presenting the market with more efficient and accurate delivery systems of cannabinoids to the body.

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about InnoCan Pharma at innocanpharma.com.

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Marimed: More US Growth in the Works for This Consistently Profitable Cannabis Company

Consumer demand for legal cannabis continues to grow in the US despite stalled legalization efforts at the federal level. Analytics company New Frontier Data, for example, projects US cannabis sales will hit US$57 billion annually by 2030, with that number possibly reaching $72 billion if 18 additional states permit adult recreational use.

MariMed (CSE:MRMD) has developed into a premier seed-to-consumer multi-state operator with expertise in cultivation, production and dispensary operations. The company has a track record of sustainable revenue growth along with one of the strongest EBITDA margins in the industry, projecting $135 million to $140 million in revenue for 2022, as well as $35 million to $40 million in adjusted EBITDA.

The Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine recently spoke with MariMed President Jon Levine, who discussed the company’s growth prospects, how it plans to increase shareholder value and the ways in which US federal legalization efforts influence MariMed’s business.

What distinguishes MariMed from other US multi-state operators?

MariMed is a company that prides itself on its history and a leadership team with a strong track record of winning licences. We built this company over several years – first as advisors helping businesses win their applications and building out their facilities, and now as acquirers working to consolidate those businesses under the MariMed footprint.

Today, we have a lot of team members and facilities with deep industry knowledge, including several members of our executive leadership team. Our CEO Bob Fireman, COO Tim Shaw and I have been working together in this industry for more than a decade.

Why did you choose the states in which you operate, and do you have plans to expand to other states?

In the beginning, MariMed submitted applications in multiple states that were available for licensing and focused on getting those states up and running. Now that MariMed has consolidated the businesses in Illinois, Massachusetts and Maryland, we are focused on expanding to the maximum allowable by law in each of those states.

In Massachusetts, for example, we plan to add two more adult-use dispensaries to our fully vertical, seed-to-sale operation there. In Illinois, we recently added a cultivation-and-processing licence that, once operational, will make us fully vertical in that high-growth state, and we also acquired a licence to build a fifth adult-use dispensary. Illinois allows operators to own and operate a maximum of 10 dispensaries, so we are also focused on adding an additional five to maximize our retail operations in that state.

Additionally, we’re looking for other markets we can expand into that have limited licences and are within the larger regions we presently operate in. We can go in and do the same build out where we go fully vertical as quickly as possible.

What are MariMed’s plans to enhance shareholder value?  

We have an exciting future ahead of us. As I mentioned, we’re building out Illinois, Massachusetts and Maryland with additional locations. We’ve also recently won licences in Ohio and Connecticut. 

We’re also going to continue to expand into additional states through either acquisitions or through the licensing process. Then we’ll build them to be as fully vertical as quickly as possible.

We’re also going to expand our branded products, including Betty’s Eddies, Kalm Fusion, Bubby’s Baked and Vibations: High + Energy, which have all been very successful in each of the states in which they are presently distributed. We’re going to make them bigger and stronger, as well as expand them into additional states over the next several years.

How do you intend to finance your growth plans?

We’re presently cash-flow positive and generating additional cash every month. So, we’ve been using cash flow from operations to expand at a slower rate. But with the current down market making equity issuance not the best option for shareholders, there are opportunities to borrow non-dilutive money at attractive rates given our financial strength and clean balance sheet.

What impact, if any, has the government’s inability to introduce federal cannabis legalization had on your business?

It’s a disappointment for MariMed because we would like to see some form of the SAFE Banking Act passed. That’s less important for our company, as our strong management team has learned how to operate within these tough confines of borrowing and banking abilities for over a decade. The SAFE Banking Act is really about helping smaller cannabis entrepreneurs that are more challenged in gaining fair and equitable access to capital.

We would love to see the SAFE Banking Act passed, and with the right amount of social equity reform included in it. But even with the continued delays at the federal level, MariMed can still operate efficiently and successfully. We’re going full steam ahead in building additional opportunities for our investors.

Finally, what do your shareholders have to look forward to in the next 12 months? 

Our investors should expect continued success and growth. Over the next 12 months, we will open additional retail and cultivation facilities, generating more revenue, and increasing the number of consumers that can access our great brands. We’ve been very successful over the last few years, and we’re going to continue that trend.

Our shareholders should expect MariMed to have a strong balance sheet with the ability to expand our cash flow and to borrow money at reasonable rates to accelerate the expansion of our business to get to the next level. We may be considered a small MSO, but we are going to become much bigger. 

In this market, we have a wonderful opportunity to continue to grow. I think our shareholders will benefit from patience and expect that we will continue to grow over the next several years.

This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about MariMed at marimedinc.com. 

CSE Issuer Stories, Magazine

Cresco Labs: Top-Tier House of Brands Acquires a Major Retail Network and Sets its Sights on Becoming Number One

Cresco Labs (CSE:CL) Chief Executive Officer Charlie Bachtell believes that when it comes to cannabis, brands matter just as much as in any other industry. Branding Cresco’s retail stores Sunnyside, rather than simply using the parent company name, is but one example of this concept at work.

There are 51 Sunnyside stores across seven states, all brightly coloured and selling products in packaging that would be right at home on the shelves of Whole Foods or CVS.

Different Cresco Labs products have their own unique branding too, depending on their target audience. There’s the namesake Cresco, the flagship “excellent everyday cannabis,” packaged in sleek, matte-coloured containers.

Then there’s Mindy’s, a line of restaurant quality edibles made in collaboration with a James Beard award-winning chef. The packaging has a deep red colour and black cursive font – it looks indulgent. It’s a Cresco Labs product just the same, but it has a totally different identity.

Bachtell emphasizes the importance of a house of brands strategy rather than what he calls a “branded house” where everything is named for the company itself. Consumers are loyal to brands they trust, and you cultivate that trust by speaking to your target audience.

“One thing we realized very early is that the cannabis consumer is very wide and varied,” Bachtell says. “You’ve got your 21-year-old male college student, but you’ve also got your 63-year-old grandmother. They’re effectively walking to the same store to buy the same product, but they want it to look and feel very differently from each other.”

The dedication to brand differentiation is paying off. Cresco Labs had the top branded product portfolio in the second quarter, according to cannabis sector analytics firm BDSA, including the top portfolio of branded flower, the top portfolio of branded concentrates, the second-highest portfolio of branded vapes and a top five portfolio of branded edibles.

The company grew even stronger in March when it announced a definitive agreement to acquire what Bachtell refers to as “the largest engine of value creation in the industry,” New York-based Columbia Care. Once complete, the acquisition will bring 131 facilities (99 dispensaries and 32 cultivation and manufacturing locations) into the Cresco Labs family in one fell swoop. The transaction is expected to close around year-end.

Creating scale in the US cannabis industry is a challenge, in no small part because regulations vary from state to state. Most cannabis companies, Cresco Labs included, generate 75% of their revenue from their three biggest states, according to Bachtell.

But with Columbia Care under the umbrella, Bachtell expects to have eight states contributing at least US$100 million to the top line in 2023. That’s significant diversification.

“We are matching the most productive per-store retail operating model with one of the largest combined retail store platforms in the industry,” Bachtell explained on the company’s earnings call to review the second quarter. “We are creating an unmatched diversification and balance of revenue by geography and by channel.”

Speaking of geography, Cresco Labs is number one in market share in Illinois, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. The goal is to be in the top three in every state where the company operates.

Bachtell is based in Illinois, where before he co-founded Cresco, he was general counsel for a mortgage company. He started that job in 2007, just in time for the housing market to be engulfed by the Great Recession.

The mortgage industry went from relatively unregulated to highly regulated overnight, Bachtell says, and those in the business had to figure out how to navigate rapidly shifting sands.

When a colleague suggested they get into the cannabis business in 2013, Illinois was just about to pass a law legalizing medical cannabis. Bachtell was skeptical it would be a good fit for him, but then he saw the legislation.

As it turned out, mortgage banking and cannabis sales have something in common.

“I read the bill, and it was as well-drafted and thorough as legislation that was geared toward that banking industry through the last five years of crazy regulatory and legislative initiatives,” he says. “I felt like I had read this book before.”

What Bachtell realized then is that cannabis would never be less regulated than it was at the time. Especially if federal legalization eventually became law, cannabis would develop into a consumer product whether the industry knew it then or not.

The cannabis industry, according to Cresco, can be broken down into four verticals: cultivation and manufacturing, building consumer brands, distributing those brands onto as many shelves as possible, and retail locations. The goal is to excel at all four, but Cresco is prioritizing the middle two. That’s the way the wind is blowing, according to Bachtell.

For example, if cannabis products do end up on the shelves of your local pharmacy, that makes brands more important than brick and mortar retail stores.

Illinois also became the first state to require that products be packaged in childproof containers. That cemented the importance of packaging in what Cresco Labs considers its mission to this day: normalizing, professionalizing and revolutionizing cannabis.

“If Illinois was going to require you to put it in a container, then that becomes your Coca-Cola can, your Budweiser bottle, your Marlboro cigarette pack, your Tylenol box,” Bachtell explains. “However you want to think about cannabis, it just became a consumer product good.”

Bachtell is the first to admit that the cannabis business is complicated. With all manner of different state regulations and federal legalization not yet realized, it’s not an easy industry to navigate. But it’s where Bachtell feels he belongs.

“I knew what the industry needed at that time, which was somebody to come in that had been through this kind of chaos before and knew how to normalize and professionalize an industry that people were concerned about.”

Investors are concerned too, he says, and fatigued by the lack of federal progress. Cannabis companies can’t trade on the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq while cannabis is federally illegal, and there is no shortage of OTC-traded companies jockeying for position.

But Bachtell believes Cresco Labs can become the most important company in cannabis. With a vibrant house of brands and an acquisition that more than doubles the company’s retail footprint, the mortgage lawyer turned cannabis CEO looks to have collected all the pieces to the puzzle.


This story was featured in Canadian Securities Exchange Magazine.

Learn more about Cresco Labs at www.crescolabs.com.