The founders of New England Treatment Access, which has marijuana operations in Northampton, Brookline and Franklin, says they are not just “cashing out” their investment by selling the company to the larger Surterra Wellness.

Instead, co-founder Kevin Fisher said NETA is positioning itself to take advantage as more states — and he believes the federal government — liberalize marijuana laws in the coming years.

“It’s a maturing of the industry, that’s for sure,” Fisher said. “I think you’ll see more of this across the industry. You will see some organizations cash out. For us, this is about continuing to build a business.”

New England Treatment Access' name will not change in the near term. Fisher will continue as an executive with Surterra, gaining a himself a seat on the board of the combined company. Fisher did not know what would happen with the other NETA founders.

NETA’s other employees will transition to becoming Surterra employees.

On Monday, NETA, which opened one of the first recreational marijuana shops in Massachusetts in November, was sold to a larger company with marijuana operations in Florida, Texas, and Nevada.

The sale is subject to approval by the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission and will require certain local approvals, according to a news release.

The sale price was not disclosed, but Surterra touted it as one of the largest transactions ever in the cannabis industry.

NETA first opened as a medical marijuana dispensary in Northampton in October 2015.

Fisher expects that at some point, marijuana will turn into a commodity — a product mostly differentiated by price and not necessarily by brand name or variety.

"You are going to have to have some scale," he said.

Governors in Pennsylvania, Connecticut and most recently New York have announced plans to at least explore legalizing marijuana. Talks are ongoing in New Jersey as well.

Opening marijuana businesses in multiple states is hard. It takes capital to invest and the expertise of running a large company that deals with many different sets of state-by-state regulations.

Add to that the entrance of major players in the marijuana business. In December, Altria, the maker of Marlboro and other brands of cigarettes, bought a 45 percent stake in Cronos Holdings, a Canadian marijuana company, for $1.8 billion.

”The marijuana industry is moving very quickly right now," Fisher said. “We have interest in other states. There are skill sets we don’t have.”

That’s where Surterra Wellness and CEO William “Beau” Wrigley Jr. comes in, Fisher said.

Wrigley is one of “those” Wrigleys, an heir to the chewing gum fortune. In 1999, he took over the business his great-grandfather started in 1891. He grew the company, buying Altoids and Life Savers, before selling the whole company to Mars Inc. in 2008 for $23 billion

The expertise Fisher said NETA needs is Wrigley’s history as an executive with the family candy and gum company.

Up until now, Surterra Wellness has been in the medical, not recreational, marijuana business. It’s headquarters are in Atlanta, but its operations are centered in Florida, where medical marijuana is legal.

NETA locations in Massachusetts won't change very much with the sale, Fisher said. But Surterra does have some products that NETA doesn't offer and that he'd like to offer here.

Also, Surterra allows NETA to offer a 401(k) retirement plan as well as a stock-purchase plan.

He said NETA plans to expand its medical marijuana facility in Brookline into recreational sales. He also said NETA also will add marijuana sales to it growing operation in Franklin.

NETA has 450 employees now and will grow to 550 in a year.

Surterra Wellness said it grew from 100 to over 550 employees in 2018 and anticipates continued aggressive growth throughout 2019.

Surterra said it has 300,000 square feet of canopy-covered growing space throughout Florida with contracts to expand to more than 500,000 square feet of cultivation by mid-2019.

In September, it reached a licensing deal with Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville team to create a new medical marijuana brand, Coral Reefer.