September 27, 2018 3 min read

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Leafwire’s Future of Cannabis Pitch Contest has already visited Denver and Los Angeles, and on 9/20, made it’s first stop in Miami, in partnerships with the Miami chapter of CannabisLAB.

Seven cannabis companies each had three minutes to pitch and then three minutes of Q&A from the judges to determine a winner. Congrats to David Fleisher, CFO, of Blue Moon Hemp who won first place and a $1,000 cash prize, sponsored by Phyto Partners, LP.

Blue Moon Hemp is a veteran in the CBD space, having been founded in 2015, and has already sold one million bottles of CBD oil made from a single genetic strain grown by a Kentucky farmer using sustainable farming techniques. Their extraction technique yields a product that is 99.96 percent pure.

The public perception of CBD is shifting, according to Fleisher. “The world opened it’s eyes to CBD this week with the news from Coca Cola,” he said referring to news Coke is exploring a CBD-infused beverage.

He added that hemp/CBD is hot right now because, “Quite simply, it works. The efficacy is undeniable in balancing an individual’s endocannibinoid system (ECS) to the extent that people are discarding traditional pharma regimens in favor of a natural alternative which actually changes the biology of the body.”

Related: The Evolving Cannabis Market Offers Limitless Opportunities

Second place in the competition was awarded to Rafael Sabbagh, CEO of Guru Systems, a software platform that provides cannabis companies with a single multi-states software solution that can track seed-to-sale, manage online ordering, text message marketing, loyalty programs, cost/supply tracking and more. Typically companies would use several different solutions to tackle all of these challenges.

Sabbagh says Guru Systems is needed because, as the industry is changing, cannabis companies are demanding more multi-purpose solutions. “Right now we're seeing a shift in focus from compliance tools to commerce tools. It’s a shift that's been gradually increasing since 2017 but we're really starting to see the effects of it on the market, where both the supply and demand sides have been investing more time and resource into tools that help reach audiences and facilitate commerce versus strict compliance and tracking," Sabbagh shared.

Judges for the event included Brett Finkelstein, managing director of Phyto Partners, LP; Brian Zisk, venture partner at Exponential Creativity Ventures; Matthew Ginder, senior counsel at Greenspoon Marder Law; and Masha Belinson, founder and CEO of Extract Cannabis Collective.

Related: 3 Hottest Cannabis Trends in California

Leafwire hosts these events every month to demonstrate the platform is built to connect investors with cannabis companies that are fundraising. By holding these events, we can achieve in the offline world what the platform is built to do online, every day.

Leawfire’s next Future of Cannabis Pitch Contest will be held at New West Summit 4.0 in Oakland on Oct. 11 and includes a $10,000 prize. Judges include:

Emily Paxhia, managing director of Poseidon Asset Management; Tahira Rehmatullah, managing director of Hypur Ventures; Giadha Aguirre de Carcer, founder and CEO of New Frontier Data; and Scott Williamson of Big Rock.

To apply to pitch in the contest or attend the event, please visit:

https://www.newwestsummit.com/investment/

(Full Disclosure – I am the Co-founder and CEO of Leafwire, the company that hosted this competition)