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FUNMAN

12/02/19 11:22 AM

#122 RE: cartonet #121

Indiva Reports Third Quarter Fiscal 2019 Results

Mon December 2, 2019 7:00 AM
Canada Newswire

https://seekingalpha.com/pr/17714396-indiva-reports-third-quarter-fiscal-2019-results

LONDON, ON, Dec. 2, 2019 /CNW/ - Indiva Limited (NDVAF) (the "Company" or "Indiva") (TSXV:NDVA) (OTCQX:NDVAF) announced its financial and operating results for the third quarter ending September 30, 2019. All figures are reported in Canadian dollars ($), unless otherwise indicated. Indiva's financial statements are prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards ("IFRS"). For a more comprehensive overview of the corporate and financial highlights presented in this press release, please refer to Indiva's Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations for the Three and Nine Month Periods Ended September 30, 2019, and the Company's Condensed Consolidated Interim Financial Statements for the Three and Nine Month Periods Ended September 30, 2019 and 2018, which are filed on SEDAR and available on the Company's website www.indiva.com.

KEY OPERATING RESULTS AND HIGHLIGHTS FROM Q3 2019

* Net revenues were $185,539 in Q3 2019 versus nil in Q3 2018. Total revenue for nine months ended September 30, 2019, equaled $600,408.

* Gross margin, before fair value adjustments, was $26,816, which was slightly down from the prior quarter of $46,286 due to higher input costs.

* Net loss increased from $2.3 million in Q2 2019 to $2.6 million. The increased losses resulted from higher operating expenses as the business grew in anticipation of the Company's launch of derivatives, including extract and edible products.

* Total assets increased to $31.0 million from $30.2 million from Q2 2019.

* Inventory increased significantly from $1.7 million at Q2 2019 to $4.6 million. This increase resulted from Indiva preparing to deliver edible products upon receipt of its edibles, extracts and topicals sales amendment.

* On July 24, 2019, Indiva announced that it received approval to distribute dry flower, pre-rolls and capsules to Quebec.

* On August 7, 2019, Indiva announced that it entered into a definitive agreement to provide extraction services to TerrAscend. Under the terms of the agreement, TerrAscend committed to providing a minimum of 800 kg per year of dry flower to Indiva for extraction.

EVENTS SUBSEQUENT TO QUARTER END

* On October 15, 2019, Indiva completed a debt financing with an institutional lender consisting of a $7.5 million secured bridge loan facility and a $6.5 million secured demand loan facility, for aggregate debt financing in an amount up to $11 million. Indiva may repay the demand loan at any time without penalty.

* On October 21, 2019, Indiva announced that it had received approval for its phase three expansion amendment. This expansion added 10,000 square feet of production space, including three new grow rooms and two additional processing rooms. The additional processing rooms are currently operational and are dedicated to edible and pre-roll production.

* On October 22, 2019, Indiva announced that it would manufacture and distribute pre-rolls for The Supreme Cannabis Company Inc.'s portfolio of brands. The Company expects that Indiva-crafted pre-rolls will be available for shipment by December 2019 and will be reflected in Q4 2019 revenue.

* To date, Indiva has secured product distribution with six provinces including Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, Alberta, Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan.

* In late October 2019, the Company began production of its cannabis-infused milk and dark chocolate. It reached commercial scale at the end of November 2019. Stability testing has shown very consistent dosing from package-to-package as well as intra-package.

* Subsequent to Q3 2019, the Company submitted its phase four amendment to Health Canada to licence the final phase of its facility. Upon receipt of the amendment, the entire facility in London, Ontario, will be licensed apart from the carved-out space for future on-site retail and education.

"We continued to solidify our foundation in the third quarter of 2019," Niel Marotta, Indiva's President and Chief Executive Officer, said. "We are poised for significant revenue growth in 2020. Achieving commercial scale in chocolate production in such a short period of time reflects the strength of our team and our partnerships. With distribution in place across six provinces, Indiva will be able to provide product to over 90% of eligible consumers. Indiva continues to progress through the process of obtaining its sales amendment for extracts, edibles and topicals and looks forward to delivering high-quality, safe and consistent cannabis products to consumers coast-to-coast. Industry experts anticipate that millions of Canadians will try cannabis for the first time as edibles, topicals and extracts become readily available. Indiva has diligently executed its strategy with the focus being on this chapter of Canada's cannabis story. We are proud to offer those new of-age Canadians truly exceptional and consistent products. Finally, Indiva's ability to secure $11 million in debt financing, subsequent to quarter-end, is a testament to the experience of our team and confidence in our strategy. We are well positioned to emerge as a leader in 2020 and are proud to enter Cannabis 2.0 with the right infrastructure, leadership and product lines."

SELECT FINANCIAL INFORMATION AS AT AND FOR THE THREE MONTHS ENDED SEPTEMBER 30, 2019

To read the rest, click on this link:

https://seekingalpha.com/pr/17714396-indiva-reports-third-quarter-fiscal-2019-results

FUNMAN

12/07/19 9:17 PM

#123 RE: cartonet #121

Indiva Announces White-Label Partnership With Dycar Pharmaceuticals Ltd. and Unsecured Convertible Debenture Financing Up to $4 Million

December 06, 2019 21:11

http://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2019/12/07/1957509/0/en/Indiva-Announces-White-Label-Partnership-With-Dycar-Pharmaceuticals-Ltd-and-Unsecured-Convertible-Debenture-Financing-Up-to-4-Million.html

This should having some meaning on Monday.

LONDON, Ontario, Dec. 06, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Indiva Limited (the “Company” or “Indiva”) (TSXV:NDVA) (OTCQX:NDVAF) is pleased to announce a strategic partnership with Dycar Pharmaceuticals Ltd. (“Dycar”) and a concurrent non-brokered unsecured convertible debenture financing of up to $4 million.

DYCAR PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION PARTNERSHIP

Indiva has entered into a financing and white-label manufacturing arrangement with Dycar. Under the terms of the letter agreement, Dycar will provide Indiva with initial non-dilutive financing of $3.1 million, and Indiva will manufacture and distribute certain Dycar-branded cannabis products from the Company’s licensed facility in London, Ontario. The financing will be repaid by the deduction of Indiva services in kind to Dycar. The letter agreement may be renewed at the option of Dycar for a minimum of two additional terms, resulting in up to $4.5 million of additional non-dilutive financing. Indiva anticipates that it will begin the production of Dycar branded products in Q1 2020.

“We are delighted to add such a high-quality partner to our B2B platform,” Niel Marotta, President and Chief Executive Officer of Indiva, said. “Dycar and Indiva are very much aligned in our shared pursuit of delivering the very best products to market. We are very excited to begin working with the Dycar team and creating new products that meet and exceed customer and consumer expectations.”

Funding is expected to occur in mid-December 2019, subject to the satisfaction of customary conditions including the execution of definitive agreements and receipt of applicable third party approvals.

CONVERTIBLE DEBENTURE FINANCING

Indiva is also announcing a concurrent non-brokered unsecured convertible debenture financing of up to $4 million. The Company will issue debentures at a price of $1,000 per debenture with each debenture convertible into 5,000 Indiva common shares at a price of $0.20 per share. The debentures will receive 10% interest paid semi-annually, on June 30 and December 31, and will mature 36 months from the date of closing. The financing is expected to close on or around December 10, 2019, subject to the approval of the TSX Venture Exchange. Certain principals of Dycar are expected to participate in the financing.

ABOUT INDIVA
Indiva’s family of cannabis brands set the standard for quality and innovation. Indiva aims to bring its exceptional portfolio of products to Canadians and cannabis enthusiasts around the world as laws permit. Indiva’s production facility, based in London, Ontario, includes a craft grow operation and an extraction and manufacturing space, which can process 70 tonnes of biomass annually and produce safe, high-quality, cannabis-infused edibles. In Canada, Indiva will produce and distribute Ruby® Cannabis Sugar, Sapphire™ Cannabis Salt and Gems™, as well as the award-winning Bhang® Chocolate, and other derivative products through licence agreements and joint ventures. Click here to connect with Indiva on social media and here to find more information on the Company and its products.

MEDIA CONTACT
Kate Abernathy
Vice President of Communications
Phone: 613-296-5764
Email: kabernathy@Indiva.com

INVESTOR CONTACT
Steve Low
Investor Relations
Phone: 647-620-5101
Email: slow@Indiva.com

DISCLAIMER AND READER ADVISORY
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) has in any way passed upon the merits of the Transaction and neither of the foregoing entities accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release or has in any way approved or disapproved of the contents of this press release.

Certain statements contained in this press release constitute forward-looking information. These statements relate to future events or future performance. The use of any of the words “could”, “intend”, “expect”, “believe”, “will”, “projected”, “estimated” and similar expressions and statements relating to matters that are not historical facts are intended to identify forward-looking information and are based on the parties’ current belief or assumptions as to the outcome and timing of such future events. Actual future results may differ materially. In particular, this release contains forward-looking information relating to the Company's future operations, future product offerings and entry into additional markets, changes to laws and regulations in Canada and internationally, and compliance with applicable regulations. Various assumptions or factors are typically applied in drawing conclusions or making the forecasts or projections set out in forward-looking information. Those assumptions and factors are based on information currently available to the parties. The material factors and assumptions include the parties being able to obtain the necessary regulatory and other third parties’ approvals and licensing and other risks associated with regulated entities in the cannabis industry. The forward-looking information contained in this release is made as of the date hereof and the parties are not obligated to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by applicable securities laws. Because of the risks, uncertainties and assumptions contained herein, investors should not place undue reliance on forward looking information. The foregoing statements expressly qualify any forward-looking information contained herein.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any of the securities in the United States. The securities have not been and will not be registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the “U.S. Securities Act”) or any state securities laws and may not be offered or sold within the United States or to U.S. Persons unless registered under the U.S. Securities Act and applicable state securities laws or an exemption from such registration is available. Not for distribution to U.S. Newswire Services or for dissemination in the United States. Any failure to comply with this restriction may constitute a violation of U.S. Securities laws.

FUNMAN

12/13/19 11:24 AM

#124 RE: cartonet #121

WOW ... Price ... $0.1911 ... Day's Change ... 0.021 ... (12.38%)

Volume(Light) ...5,000 ... December 13, 2019 ... 10:31am ET

FUNMAN

12/23/19 11:04 PM

#131 RE: cartonet #121

Cannabis 2.0: Industry turns a new leaf after tough first year of legal pot

https://www.woodstocksentinelreview.com/news/local-news/cannabis-2-0-industry-turns-a-new-leaf-after-tough-first-year-of-legal-pot/wcm/9e6919a4-3771-4e52-b849-cdd51e511908

Candies, creams, drinks and more have opened a new $2.5-billion market for Canada's infant pot industry, big portions of which took a pounding from the first year of legal marijuana.

Dale Carruthers reports
Published on: December 22, 2019
Last Updated: December 22, 2019 11:28 AM EST

Inside a nondescript south London building, a worker in a white lab coat and purple latex gloves packages squares of high-end chocolate. He puts the packaged chocolate on a stainless steel table, where another worker seals the small bag and drops it onto a blue conveyor belt that deposits it into a large plastic bin.

The bins, each packed with hundreds of the treats, are carted off to be stored in a nearby vault.

It may look like a normal confectionery factory, but it’s not: This one is in the business of making cannabis-infused chocolate. The operation at London-based Indiva has been running since October, when Health Canada gave cannabis companies the green light to begin making marijuana-infused foods, drinks, concentrates and topicals.

Welcome to Cannabis 2.0, the next wave in the rollout of legal marijuana products in Canada.

Recreational marijuana use became legal in the fall of 2018, triggering a massive new industry to grow cannabis – one that quickly made Southwestern Ontario, with more than a dozen major producers from Windsor to Brantford and north beyond London, a significant pot belt.

Cannabis companies nationwide, including many in Southwestern Ontario, are salivating at the chance to sell edibles, concentrates and ointments and creams. Those products were legalized Oct. 17, but aren’t expected to be available for sale until January at the earliest because of federal health regulations and delays getting the supply chain up and going.

The timing could not be more critical for an industry that took a pounding in the first year of legalized marijuana sales, building out far more capacity to grow pot than could be sold in the limited number of legal stores. Shares in what were then Canada’s 10 largest pot producers by market capitalization lost an average of more than half their value, stinging many investors.

The growing pains were especially acute in Ontario, the nation’s largest market, where the government has so far approved only 25 pot stores, a fraction of the number operating in some other provinces.

In the fallout, the industry has shelved expansion plans, laid off workers and had trouble securing credit, increasing the heat on edibles to help the bottom line.

“There’s a lot of pressure on regulators here to get this stuff out,” lawyer Eric Foster, who heads the cannabis practice at Dentons Canada, said of the new products.

“The companies are going to be pushing really hard on it, because a lot of them are expecting this to be really important for driving revenue for them.”

Indiva has been laying the groundwork for its chocolate-making since 2017, chief executive Niel Marotta said.

“We were very early in pursuing this. We signed this agreement with Bhang two years ago,” Marotta said of the American chocolate maker with which Indiva partnered to bring its sweet treats to the Canadian market.

Each bar contains 10 milligrams of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the maximum amount of the psychoactive component in cannabis allowed by federal regulators, but can be divided into four pieces.

“We think cannabis is a social experience . . . When you break it up and share it four ways, everyone is going to get the same amount of cannabis,” Marotta said.

Marotta acknowledges his company can’t compete with other producers in supplying dried cannabis, the nation’s most in-demand cannabis product, so Indiva is trying to carve out a niche with its marijuana-infused chocolate, sugar and salt.

South of the Canada-U.S. border, in states like Colorado and California, where edibles and concentrates have been legal for years, the products’ total market share has steadily grown to nearly half of total marijuana sales.

In Canada, the market for cannabis edibles and other 2.0 products is expected to be worth more than $2.5 billion, according to a 2019 report by Deloitte, a global professional services firm.

Canadian cannabis companies enjoy a significant advantage over their American and international counterparts because of government support, access to capital markets and a unified market, unlike the fragmented regime in the U.S., where marijuana is still illegal at the federal level, the report said.

But Canadian companies still need to innovate to secure a strong, sustainable competitive position as legislation evolves in other countries, the report said.

Cannabis industry insiders have long complained that the black market has thrived, in part, because it has been the only place for consumers to buy edibles and concentrates.

Pot firms hope the availability of the new 2.0 products will deal a blow to the black market. But some observers question whether Canada’s strict regulations, including about maximum THC doses, will keep people from abandoning illicit sources.

For example, consumers can buy a 10-pack of candies each containing 20 mg of THC for roughly $20 online and have it sent to their house, sometimes on the same day, from illegal delivery services.

In London, a handful of such black market businesses still operate in defiance of the law, while more than a dozen unsanctioned dispensaries on the nearby Oneida Nation of the Thames have long been selling edibles and concentrates.

“If due to the regulations, these new products can’t meet the consumer demands of Canadians, there’s a risk that they won’t achieve the objective policy goal of displacing the illicit market,” Foster said.

The prices of Cannabis 2.0 products will likely be higher than on the black market, but buyers may opt to pay more for products that are tested and regulated, said David Soberman, a professor of marketing at the University of Toronto.

“People are probably going to be more comfortable buying a product that’s processed for eating from a legitimate company than that same sort of thing on the black market,” he said.

All Cannabis 2.0 products must come in child-resistant, plain packaging that includes a label with a health warning, an ingredients list and the content of THC and cannabidiol (CBD), a non-psychoactive component. The products can’t be made to appeal to youth or make health claims.

Foster praises the government’s “measured” approach to rolling out the new products, noting the rules can be changed as Canadians become more familiar with edibles and concentrates.

“Laws are always capable of being changed in the future as this product becomes a little bit more socialized and, frankly, understood by the market and by Canadians,” he said.

WeedMD, a licensed producer with a 57,000-square-metre greenhouse in Strathroy, isn’t rushing its new products, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been preparing for Cannabis 2.0, chief executive Keith Merker said.

Earlier this year, WeedMD converted its indoor growing facility in Aylmer into an extraction and processing lab that will have the capability to process up to 200,000 kilograms of biomass a year.

“We don’t believe that rushing and being first to market with a given product for 2.0 is necessarily the way the game is run,” Merker said.

Setting its sights on the cannabis vaping market, the company plans to produce cartridges filled with distillate, a cannabis concentrate that can be vaporized, Merker said.

“We already located and locked down the hardware that’s required. And we have the capability to produce the distillate . . . to ultimately fill the cartridges themselves on site. We’ve got all the pieces put together,” Merker said.

While many firms are focusing on edibles and concentrates, Strathroy-based producer Eve and Co. has set its sights on topicals.

Billing itself as Canada’s premier female-focused cannabis brand, the company plans to roll out a line of CBD- and TCH-infused bath products and even a personal lubricate.

“For all of these products, we’re going to be working with partners,” Kelsey Jobson, the company’s head of product management, said.

The products will be made in-house at the Strathroy greenhouse, which now spans 93,000 square metres after a recent expansion, Jobson said.

Eve and Co. also forged a tentative deal with Colio Estate Wines, the company behind the popular Girls’ Night Out brand, to develop a cannabis-infused drink. The rosé-style beverage will contain equal parts THC and cannabidiol (CBD), the non-psychoactive component of marijuana touted for its therapeutic benefits.

A few kilometres away, at WeedMD’s Strathroy operation, the company harvested its first outdoor crop of cannabis in October, becoming one of only a handful of legal Canadian growers to do so.

When the government announced last year it was lifting its ban on outdoor cultivation, many industry insiders predicted marijuana grown outside would be used only for extracting THC and CBD.

But WeedMD’s outdoor cannabis, grown on a 10-hectare plot previously used to grow asparagus, will be used to make concentrates and also be sold as dried flower, Merker said.

“We’re slowly but surely chipping away at all those myths,” he said.

Despite all the excitement about Cannabis 2.0, Merker said his company isn’t abandoning its focus on producing a wide range of high-quality dried cannabis.

“It’s important not to ignore the fact that more than half the market is still dominated by the traditional, good old-fashioned dried flower,” he said.

dcarruthers@postmedia.com

RULES FOR CANABIS 2.0 PRODUCTS
Edibles (food and drinks)

10 mg of THC per package
No added nicotine, vitamins, minerals
Limit to caffeine added
Topicals

1,000 mg of THC per package
No added nicotine or alcohol
For use only on skin, hair and nails
Not for use on eyes or damaged skin
Extracts (for vaping)

1,000 mg of THC per package
No added nicotine, vitamins, minerals, sugars, sweeteners or colours
Extracts (ingested)

10 mg of THC per unit (for example, a capsule)
1,000 mg of THC per package
No added nicotine, vitamins, minerals, sugars, sweeteners or colours
Must include a dispensing device if not in unit form

FUNMAN

01/04/20 9:41 PM

#133 RE: cartonet #121

Cannabis 2.0: Industry turns a new leaf after tough first year of legal pot

Candies, creams, drinks and more have opened a new $2.5-billion market for Canada's infant pot industry, big portions of which took a pounding from the first year of legal marijuana.

DALE CARRUTHERS Updated: January 3, 2020

https://lfpress.com/news/local-news/cannabis-2-0-industry-turns-a-new-leaf-after-tough-first-year-of-legal-pot

Inside a nondescript south London building, a worker in a white lab coat and purple latex gloves packages squares of high-end chocolate. He puts the packaged chocolate on a stainless steel table, where another worker seals the small bag and drops it onto a blue conveyor belt that deposits it into a large plastic bin.

The bins, each packed with hundreds of the treats, are carted off to be stored in a nearby vault.

It may look like a normal confectionery factory, but it’s not: This one is in the business of making cannabis-infused chocolate. The operation at London-based Indiva has been running since October, when Health Canada gave cannabis companies the green light to begin making marijuana-infused foods, drinks, concentrates and topicals.

Welcome to Cannabis 2.0, the next wave in the rollout of legal marijuana products in Canada.

Watch:



Recreational marijuana use became legal in the fall of 2018, triggering a massive new industry to grow cannabis – one that quickly made Southwestern Ontario, with more than a dozen major producers from Windsor to Brantford and north beyond London, a significant pot belt.

Cannabis companies nationwide, including many in Southwestern Ontario, are salivating at the chance to sell edibles, concentrates and ointments and creams. Those products were legalized Oct. 17, but aren’t expected to be available for sale until this month at the earliest because of federal health regulations and delays getting the supply chain up and going.

The timing could not be more critical for an industry that took a pounding in the first year of legalized marijuana sales, building out far more capacity to grow pot than could be sold in the limited number of legal stores. Shares in what were then Canada’s 10 largest pot producers by market capitalization lost an average of more than half their value, stinging many investors.

The growing pains were especially acute in Ontario, the nation’s largest market, where the government has so far approved only 25 pot stores, a fraction of the number operating in some other provinces.

In the fallout, the industry has shelved expansion plans, laid off workers and had trouble securing credit, increasing the heat on edibles to help the bottom line.

“There’s a lot of pressure on regulators here to get this stuff out,” lawyer Eric Foster, who heads the cannabis practice at Dentons Canada, said of the new products.

“The companies are going to be pushing really hard on it, because a lot of them are expecting this to be really important for driving revenue for them.”

Indiva has been laying the groundwork for its chocolate-making since 2017, chief executive Niel Marotta said.

“We were very early in pursuing this. We signed this agreement with Bhang two years ago,” Marotta said of the American chocolate maker with which Indiva partnered to bring its sweet treats to the Canadian market.

Each bar contains 10 milligrams of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the maximum amount of the psychoactive component in cannabis allowed by federal regulators, but can be divided into four pieces.

“We think cannabis is a social experience . . . When you break it up and share it four ways, everyone is going to get the same amount of cannabis,” Marotta said.

Marotta acknowledges his company can’t compete with other producers in supplying dried cannabis, the nation’s most in-demand cannabis product, so Indiva is trying to carve out a niche with its marijuana-infused chocolate, sugar and salt.

South of the Canada-U.S. border, in states like Colorado and California, where edibles and concentrates have been legal for years, the products’ total market share has steadily grown to nearly half of total marijuana sales.

In Canada, the market for cannabis edibles and other 2.0 products is expected to be worth more than $2.5 billion, according to a 2019 report by Deloitte, a global professional services firm.

Canadian cannabis companies enjoy a significant advantage over their American and international counterparts because of government support, access to capital markets and a unified market, unlike the fragmented regime in the U.S., where marijuana is still illegal at the federal level, the report said.

But Canadian companies still need to innovate to secure a strong, sustainable competitive position as legislation evolves in other countries, the report said.

Cannabis industry insiders have long complained that the black market has thrived, in part, because it has been the only place for consumers to buy edibles and concentrates.

Pot firms hope the availability of the new 2.0 products will deal a blow to the black market. But some observers question whether Canada’s strict regulations, including about maximum THC doses, will keep people from abandoning illicit sources.

For example, consumers can buy a 10-pack of candies each containing 20 mg of THC for roughly $20 online and have it sent to their house, sometimes on the same day, from illegal delivery services.

In London, a handful of such black market businesses still operate in defiance of the law, while more than a dozen unsanctioned dispensaries on the nearby Oneida Nation of the Thames have long been selling edibles and concentrates.

“If due to the regulations, these new products can’t meet the consumer demands of Canadians, there’s a risk that they won’t achieve the objective policy goal of displacing the illicit market,” Foster said.

The prices of Cannabis 2.0 products will likely be higher than on the black market, but buyers may opt to pay more for products that are tested and regulated, said David Soberman, a professor of marketing at the University of Toronto.

“People are probably going to be more comfortable buying a product that’s processed for eating from a legitimate company than that same sort of thing on the black market,” he said.

All Cannabis 2.0 products must come in child-resistant, plain packaging that includes a label with a health warning, an ingredients list and the content of THC and cannabidiol (CBD), a non-psychoactive component. The products can’t be made to appeal to youth or make health claims.

Foster praises the government’s “measured” approach to rolling out the new products, noting the rules can be changed as Canadians become more familiar with edibles and concentrates.

“Laws are always capable of being changed in the future as this product becomes a little bit more socialized and, frankly, understood by the market and by Canadians,” he said.

WeedMD, a licensed producer with a 57,000-square-metre greenhouse in Strathroy, isn’t rushing its new products, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been preparing for Cannabis 2.0, chief executive Keith Merker said.

Earlier this year, WeedMD converted its indoor growing facility in Aylmer into an extraction and processing lab that will have the capability to process up to 200,000 kilograms of biomass a year.

“We don’t believe that rushing and being first to market with a given product for 2.0 is necessarily the way the game is run,” Merker said.

Setting its sights on the cannabis vaping market, the company plans to produce cartridges filled with distillate, a cannabis concentrate that can be vaporized, Merker said.

“We already located and locked down the hardware that’s required. And we have the capability to produce the distillate . . . to ultimately fill the cartridges themselves on site. We’ve got all the pieces put together,” Merker said.

While many firms are focusing on edibles and concentrates, Strathroy-based producer Eve and Co. has set its sights on topicals.

Billing itself as Canada’s premier female-focused cannabis brand, the company plans to roll out a line of CBD- and TCH-infused bath products and even a personal lubricate.

“For all of these products, we’re going to be working with partners,” Kelsey Jobson, the company’s head of product management, said.

The products will be made in-house at the Strathroy greenhouse, which now spans 93,000 square metres after a recent expansion, Jobson said.

Eve and Co. also forged a tentative deal with Colio Estate Wines, the company behind the popular Girls’ Night Out brand, to develop a cannabis-infused drink. The rosé-style beverage will contain equal parts THC and cannabidiol (CBD), the non-psychoactive component of marijuana touted for its therapeutic benefits.

A few kilometres away, at WeedMD’s Strathroy operation, the company harvested its first outdoor crop of cannabis in October, becoming one of only a handful of legal Canadian growers to do so.

When the government announced last year it was lifting its ban on outdoor cultivation, many industry insiders predicted marijuana grown outside would be used only for extracting THC and CBD.

But WeedMD’s outdoor cannabis, grown on a 10-hectare plot previously used to grow asparagus, will be used to make concentrates and also be sold as dried flower, Merker said.

“We’re slowly but surely chipping away at all those myths,” he said.

Despite all the excitement about Cannabis 2.0, Merker said his company isn’t abandoning its focus on producing a wide range of high-quality dried cannabis.

“It’s important not to ignore the fact that more than half the market is still dominated by the traditional, good old-fashioned dried flower,” he said.

dcarruthers@postmedia.com