THe Sydney Morning Herald reports
The first two months of 2020 have seen a flurry of activity as West Australian-based medical cannabis companies hunt for cash to grow their businesses to meet booming patient demand.
February will see two the public listing of two Perth medical cannabis companies, while a third startup has gone down the crowdfunding route to fund its African grow operation and the development of new medicines.
Emerald Clinics, which has established four medical cannabis access clinics across the country, floated on the ASX on February 12 after raising $6 million through its initial public offering.
WA-based Little Green Pharma was the first Australian company to produce medical cannabis from its own plants and will list on the ASX on Thursday after raising $10 million in an oversubscribed IPO.
Perth-based TetraMed is using crowdfunding campaign site OnMarket to raise $3 million, with a minimum buy-in set at $420. Currently, it has raised $360,000.
The company plans to publicly list later this year.
Unlike Little Green Pharma, which grows its cannabis in WA’s South West, TetraMed plans to source its product from the small African nation of Lesotho, where it has already begun construction on a grow facility.
A landlocked nation in the middle of South Africa may not seem like the first destination to grow medical-grade cannabis but TetraMed chief executive Vince Falbo said it was actually the only nation in Africa so far that met stringent international controls and requirements for pharmaceuticals.
Like many emerging medical cannabis companies, TetraMed’s goal is to create the entire supply chain from plant to medicine, but Mr Falbo said he wasn’t worried about market saturation given increasing global demand for quality Australian medicines.
Read full article at: https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/wa-cannabis-hopefuls-pass-the-hat-around-to-grow-operations-20200218-p541y9.html
