Debra BorchardtApril 10, 2019
U.S. based investment fund Northern Swan Holdings has completed $58 million in Series D financing, bringing the total amount of capital raised to date to $96 million. The company will be using the funds to expand its existing Latin American operations including Clever Leaves, a leading vertically integrated licensed producer of medical cannabis in Colombia.
“The closing of our Series D round validates our investment thesis, providing the capital necessary to fund rapid expansion and to capitalize on our key competitive advantages as a first-mover in the global medical cannabis market. Federally compliant in all jurisdictions in which we operate, Northern Swan is well-positioned to expand and diversify our cultivation assets as well as accelerate our mission to revolutionize the trade flows in the global medical cannabis industry,” noted Kyle Detwiler, CEO of Northern Swan.
The company will use some of the funds to invest in new low-cost, large-scale cannabis cultivation and processing centers and to build out distribution channels and brands in Europe, Latin America and North America such as Cansativa GmbH, a German cannabis distribution and Lift & Co., a Canadian marketing and data company.
Northern Swan was the financial sponsor that helped secure the import permit with Health Canada for Clever Leaves, to become the first Colombian company authorized to export cannabis into Canada. and the company just completed an investment of approximately $8 million in Cansativa GmbH in order to further accelerate the growth in their integration into the wider European market.
It is still early days for the Colombian market, but Detweiler said that the population of Colombia is 49 million people compared to just 36 million in Canada, so the outright volumes could eventually be higher, though likely with a lower price point. He also noted that while other cannabis companies are developing in-country strategies for Colombia, North Swan seems to be the leader of the export-oriented strategy.
“I believe both will be successful strategies,” said Detweiler. “There may be more risk and regulatory work which goes into an export strategy, but the reward is naturally substantially higher (e.g. grow at low-cost, sell at a high price). So, we’re pursuing the export path and obtaining the first ever import permit for shipping Colombian product to Canada illustrates we are advancing quickly. Additionally, by investing in a German importation business (the only such link between a Colombian operation and German operation I’m aware of), we are also helping expand our global distribution to Europe as well.”
Detweiler said that Germany, the UK, Switzerland, Portugal, South Africa, Australia, Chile, and Mexico are all promising export destinations for the company..
