“The pace and change is accelerating rapidly and we’re seeing well-funded, professional brands emerging,” CEO Brendan Kennedy told CNBC an interview Wednesday. “It’s a global opportunity and we think we have a first-mover advantage.”
Founded in 2013, Tilray was incorporated under Kennedy’s cannabis-focused private equity venture Privateer Holdings. Privateer, which still owns about 80 percent of the company, announced earlier this year that it has raised $200 million to invest in cannabis brands.
Billionaire investor Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund became the first institutional investor in the cannabis industry through Privateer’s $75 million Series B financing round in December 2014, according to the company’s website.
Equity statistics:
- Shares available to investors (float): 21.7 million
- Short interest: 13% of floating shares
- Price move since July 19: approx. 760 percent.
Canopy Growth (NYSE: CGC)
Canopy Growth, based in Smiths Falls, Canada, is another emerging leader in the cannabis space. Headquartered about an hour’s drive southwest of Ottawa, the company’s stock rallied earlier this week after it announced plans to acquire a U.S.-based hemp research company.
Canopy Growth said its purchase of Evergreen, Colorado-based ebbu will “complement and accelerate” its ambitions to expand into new types of consumer products, including more productive plants and the technology needed to incorporate cannabidiol into consumer goods.
Canopy was the first publicly traded cannabis company in North America in 2014 under the leadership of co-CEO Bruce Linton. The company markets medical marijuana products — including flowers and oils — in Canada, Germany and the Czech Republic and recently tightened its relationship with Corona brewer Constellation Brands.
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