A Canadian cannabis-tech company is readying a January ASX listing, capitalising on Australia’s recent move to legalise the manufacturing of medical cannabis.

RotoGro CEO Adam Clode said his system is a cheap, quick and effective way of achieving massive medical cannabis yields, and he calls it the future of indoor growing equipment.

The equipment can be loaded with up to 420 cannabis plants in a single system.

Mr Clode told The Australian cannabis stocks in Australia have been going gangbusters since it became legal to cultivate and manufacture medical cannabis from November 1.

Even for a puppy, Kat Donatello's black lab, Austin, was hyperactive. After experimenting with natural supplements on her older dog, Brady, Donatello slipped the puppy a special biscuit. "It just kind of took the edge off of him," she recalled.  

The treat contained Cannabidiol, better known as CBD, a chemical compound extracted from the marijuana plant. 

The CBD supplements were expensive, and options for pet treats were limited, Donatello said. "So I started spending my winters baking dog biscuits." She tinkered with the recipe before launching her CBD-laced biscuit company, Austin + Kat, earlier this year. 

Scale-out and tape firm knows how to adapt.

Analysis Pot plant cams in a Colorado marijuana farm feeding Quantum’s StorNext multi-tiered and scale-out, file virtualisation and data services software with surveillance camera footage show the substantial market changes to which Quantum is having to adapt.

CEO Jon Gacek told a visiting press crew in December: “I feel like the captain of a small boat in a rough sea.” His company has navigated the rough seas of the tape-based data protection market downturn when it had an ocean of debt from buying ADIC, and when the nirvana of a vastly profitable deduplicating disk backup market was hijacked by Dell EMC’s Data Domain unit.

A study released this week shows that Oregon residents, by an overwhelming majority, feel working with the marijuana industry does not damage the reputation of financial institutions. The survey also indicates banks and credit unions might enhance their standing and attract new customers in Oregon by working with the cannabis industry.

The survey, conducted by LT Public Relations (LTPR) and DHM Research, suggests financial institutions could bolster their image by making loans to marijuana businesses in Oregon. LTPR works with financial, healthcare and professional services organizations. DHM is an opinion research company. Both are based in Portland, Ore.

In 2010, when husband and wife team Scott Palmer and Kristi Knoblich were looking for just the right legal marijuana high, they found a real gap in the market. Edibles either tasted bad, were poorly labeled or just didn’t do it for them.

So they decided to make their own.

Noticing that cannabis went especially well with chocolate, the duo worked with a chocolatier to create a “cold water” method that used no butter or any other solvent to create weed chocolates. 

For the duo, who were both cannabis users, or “patients,” as they refer to legal users, it was a turning point. (“Patients” is how brands refer to legal users of medical marijuana who use it to treat ailments from joint pain to anxiety. It also sounds better than “stoners.”)

Shares in marijuana medicine-maker GW Pharmaceuticals plc (NASDAQ: GWPH) have been on a tear. From the end of May 2013, when the company's shares first began trading on the Nasdaq, through Friday, its shares have skyrocketed 1,187%. For perspective, a $10,000 investment in GW Pharmaceuticals made back then would be worth an eye-popping $128,730 today.

Is this medical marijuana company just getting started, or is the party about to come to an end?

Some background

Marijuana advocates have been cheering empirical evidence of marijuana's benefits as medicine for a while, but the medical marijuana movement has really heated up over the past 10 years.

The cannabis industry has been under pressure despite favorable state-wide election results in early November.

From an overextended industry-wide rally to highly questionable cabinet nominations by President-elect Donald Trump, concerns among cannabis investors have increased significantly over the last month.

In an effort to help improve investor education, we want to provide you with our top three cannabis investing strategies under a new White House administration.

A Focus on Quality, A Focus on Canada

One major difference stands out when comparing the legal cannabis market in the United States to that in Canada…

The Denver Post recently did a story on how cannabis businesses are having to pay sky-high rents nationwide. In Portland, for instance, commercial real estate that typically rents for five dollars per square foot goes for three times that amount for cannabis businesses. Though rents for cannabis businesses in Washington and Colorado are stable, they are considerably higher than the lease rates for any other business, and real estate investors looking to lease to cannabis businesses are mostly betting this trend will continue.

As the year comes to a close, the Cannabis Business Alliance (CBA)  reviews the highlights of 2016 and provides an outlook for 2017.

Enormous growth

Well, it's time to spark it up... on Spark!

Digital technology has shaken up a lot of industries, bringing user-friendly, design approaches to traditional ways of doing business. So it's probably no surprise that it's starting to change how marijuana is sold. After all, the marijuana trade in North America is a growing industry, as it moves from an illegal trade into an increasingly legal business, and there's no blueprint.

In September, Alberta cannabis producer Aurora Cannabis launched an app for buying legal medical marijuana from your phone or tablet. Their new app is the first of its kind. (You can even get same-day delivery if you live in Calgary or Edmonton.)