At Vancouver’s next big weed get-together, you can expect less tie-dye and more suit-and-tie.

Organizers of the International Cannabis Business Conference this week at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in downtown Vancouver expect a crowd of 650 or more to attend over Thursday and Friday.

And with tickets to attend the conference running upwards of $600 each, the event might have more of a corporate feel than the average 4/20 rally. 

The cannabis industry is growing fast. And that means there are plenty of potential business opportunities available for entrepreneurs who are interested in this expanding niche.

Serge Chistov, Chief Financial Advisor for the Honest Marijuana Company and president and founder of Serge Import LLC spoke to Small Business Trends in a phone interview about all the possibilities.

Wall Street is becoming increasingly more focused and attracted to the legal cannabis sector, the fastest growing industry in the world.

From Cowen and Co. picking up coverage on Kush Bottles (KSHB), an OTC stock, to Goldman Sachs initiating coverage on GW Pharmaceuticals (GWPH) with a Buy rating and a $189 price target, it is clear that the tide is turning.

Legal Cannabis Coming

Legal cannabis is coming and the 2016 election will serve as a catalyst to the cannabis industry as a record number of states are voting on some form of legal cannabis.

With nine states poised to legalize cannabis next month, an increasing number of my firm’s clients are seeking help on taking their cannabis business national. They want to know what it will take to cross states with their cannabis cultivation centers, their cannabis retail storefronts, or even just with their brand names. If you, too, are looking to present your cannabis business on a national stage, you need to consider the following seven things:

1.  Federal enforcement policies versus federal law.  

Medical marijuana legalization has allowed researchers to discover new and useful aspects of the plant we may not have even thought of before. From treatment of multiple diseases and illnesses such as Parkinson’s disease to lowering body mass index, Marijuana has taken over as one of the most natural and effective remedies known to man.

A dozen medicinal cannabis cultivators and processors have partnered with Medicinal Genomics to record and track the genetics of cannabis strains on the Bitcoin blockchain to ensure product consistency and quality.

From backroom to storefront, cannabis is leveraging the advances in data analytics driven by other industries.

If you're new to retail cannabis, chances are you're new to business in general. So the whole meaning and value of analytics may elude you. If analytics are new new to you, you had better get a grasp of what data means to you and your business potential.

Let's explore the effect of analytics on the cannabis economy.

The Arizona Department of Health Services awarded preliminary licenses for 31 new medical-marijuana dispensaries last week, creating a lucrative opportunity for entrepreneurs and (soon) more shopping choices for patients.

Most of the 747 applicants lost out on their hoped-for pot of green gold — not to mention the nonrefundable $4,000 of their $5,000 application fee. But the lucky few whose applications were accepted could make a fortune in the industry.

"It's fantastic," said a woman who is part of a group that won a license. "We did an enormous amount of work to get to this point."

Administrative law judge Elizabeth W. McArthur found the use of a rented jet helicopter and a mad dash to the Department of Health's headquarters are not necessarily rules violations.

The ruling came Monday in a challenge to the Department of Health awarding a marijuana license to Knox Nursery of Winter Garden.

“Maybe it was important to them,” she said, upholding a Department of Health motion to exclude incidents involving Knox’s delivery of a $5 million bond receipt.

When Lisa Mastramico needed relief for her ailing tabby, Little Kitty, she turned to an unlikely source: marijuana.

At 12 years old, the cat had arthritis. For a long while she spent her days hiding in a closet, where Ms. Mastramico had built her a bed of plush blankets. After trying various supplements that proved ineffectual, she went to a meeting for Women Grow, an industry group for cannabis entrepreneurs.

She was not sold on the idea right away. “My concern was that it’s not my place to get my cat high,” said Ms. Mastramico, the director of a public access television network in Long Beach, Calif.