I’ve made no secret of the fact that the Canadian cannabis market frequently annoys the hell out of me. What I want is for it to be a mature space that more and more adults are making use of, and that is free to innovate, free to be excellent, free to market itself properly, and free to grow, so more consumers who may have fear of the sector or figure its too much work to engage with it, decide instead to take part.

A healthy Canadian cannabis space would make for healthier Canadians in general, a fatter tax base, and an opportunity to export knowledge, products, and brands the world over.

The problem is, in Canada the rules are made by Health Canada and a hand wringing procession of governments that have only ever taken one of two stances; either the whole industry is rotten and can’t be trusted so it mustn’t be allowed to do business freely, or the industry is far too complicated and should police itself and licenses should be handed out by the hundreds. Generally speaking, it’s been an eclectic mixture of the two. Hundreds of licenses make proper regulation and healthy competition impossible, and impossible regulations make using those licenses unprofitable.

It’s stupid. That said, there is growth potential in the North American cannabis space. Yes, the American market is opening up and, yes, that will drive US-based share prices up exponentially for a while. But that doesn’t do much for Canadian licensed producers who will, by and large, be caged out of the American space.

Thus, the Canadian weed companies need to be more clever and be less focused on farming, and more focused on Intellectual Property (IP). They need to innovate in ways that will bring their products to the masses better, cheaper, and more effectively, and in owning the tech that does so, so that the Americans will hand over millions to take part.

• Teas? Anyone can do that.
• Vape pens? Pretty much, same.
• Oils? Good luck getting your dosage right.
• Beverages? Yeah, that’s what I need – an energy drink that tastes like grass and ass.

The overarching question should be, how do we gussy up our cannabinoids so those who don’t know they need them will try them?

We need companies finding new ways to deliver products, better ways to deliver products, less expensive ways to deliver products, and with platforms non-scary enough that they’ll sit happily next to the echinacea and Cold FX in the drug store, and that mom won’t feel paranoid about putting on the cashier’s desk next to the gallon of milk and Flintstones vitamins.

Canntab (PILL.V) is a company that sits firmly in that space.

No, they’re not on your watch list because, for the last few years, they haven’t been out there pumping a story that they had to be. They haven’t been trying to get licenses to grow weed themselves, and they haven’t been buying up assets and raising hundreds of millions of dollars and building aircraft hangar sized processing facilities and Madison Avenue marketing teams.

They set out to do one important thing; to prove, and to patent, the technology behind hard press multi layered pills, delivering cannabidiols to adult patients.

What Canntab has, is the granted patent to multi-layered, timed release, hard-pressed tablets.

TL/DR: Take a pill, get the THC, get the CBD, in a measured, accurate dose, timed to release in stages.

Yes, that technology exists in the pharmaceutical world already, but the patent to do it with cannabis? That’s owned by Canntab.

Canntab’s legal counsel on intellectual property, Gavin Bogle of Magyar, Bogle & O’Hara LLP, said: “The allowance of Canntab’s patent by the Canadian Intellectual Property Office provides fundamental intellectual protection for Canntab’s innovative tableting technology and validates the years of research and development the company has conducted. The company now has patent protection in Canada and the USA, providing an international scope to the company’s expanding portfolio of issued patents.”

Boomshanka.

Sure, any LP could make a hard pressed pill to deliver a good time at a Friday dinner party, but they’d need to ask Canntab’s permission first, and grace their palm with silver.

Sure, there are soft gels out there already, and basic capsules have been on the market for a while, and none of those are blowing the doors off. That’s because, and you’ll want to keep the kids away from the screen for this bit: they’re shit.

Currently, there are no products out there, from edibles to oils to tinctures to vape pens to good old flower bud, that delivers an accurate dosage of THC and CBD, consistent from one use to the next. It doesn’t happen with a gel cap. It sure doesn’t happen with a capsule. And god help you if you think you know what you’re getting in a gummy or a beverage. My face has melted so many times, I look like the end scene of Temple of Doom at least a few times a month, and that just won’t play for grandma, who could use the soothing effects of cannabidiols but will fall and break her damn hip if she gets a little too heavy a dose.

When grandma is going to be convinced to try cannabis products as a medical option is when every pill is exactly the same, and when the release of the elements within that pill can be timed, in a way that allows your body to get the end result you’re looking for.

When her doctor is impressed enough by the clinical trials and understands what and how much to prescribe, they’ll prescribe that medication. When those trials demonstrate what the product will fix, and present an option to do so in a safe way, insurance companies will pay for it. That’s our perfect world, when cannabis companies will find their business doubling overnight and finally reward investors on something outside of hype and promise.

Let’s be greedy for a minute and think about my needs, as they pertain to cannabis products. I’m 50 years old so, yes, occasionally it’s nice to get high and giggle at reality TV, but that’s not what I’m sniffing about the weed scene for. I want to take something that quietly, comfortably, before I go to bed at night, starts to wind me down, relax me, and line me up for a good night’s sleep. I’d like that CBD hit because I know the health benefits are real. And you know what else? In the future, I’d kinda like a microdose psychedelic hit worked in that makes my dreams funky, and gets me a little bit more creative so I’m full of ideas and clarity in the morning.

That’s my ‘god’ product, that would be a daily use for me – if it existed – and one I would evangelize to others. With the Canntab tech, that product can be a reality.

Not for a little while, sure, because the laws on psychedelics still have to change to allow such a thing of ethereal beauty to happen. For now, legally, Canntab’s IP can be licensed by any weed company to create a pill that does the first half of that journey for me. If I can put multivitamins in there too, or if I could put relaxants in there when my back is sore, or I could put stimulants in there because it’s been a long week and I’m out of Red Bull, if I can create a pill that gives me x plus y, and times the release so I don’t get obliterated by it, that’s something I want to try – and that’s something that Canntab can do.

And as US states open up to cannabis products and, indeed, as states like Oregon decriminalize psychedelics and take the first steps towards opening that industry, the ability to create a multi layered, multi-faceted, multi-drug product exists right now at Canntab HQ.

I’m not going to tell you that if you invest in Canntab today, that tomorrow it’ll take off. I’m not going to tell you that if you don’t invest now you might miss the train, or that they’re definitely going to be making 100 million dollars a year within three months because that’s not it.

This isn’t an exploding stock, this is a smart stock. It’s not a hype run, it’s a legitimacy marathon. If Canntab dropped one news release that mentioned psychedelics, it’d go on a short, silly run and lose a lot of respect from important people, but they’re not doing that – even though their tech is equally as useful for psilocybin as it is cannabidiols.

They’re playing it straight, proving their patents out, developing real world products that NON-CANNABIS CONSUMERS will try, and gunning for a business model in which OTHER COMPANIES will pay them to sell their products.

As they now start to sell that product and to license it on to bigger companies, as they have been doing, the bricks are beginning to take the shape of a defendable fortress.

The beauty for me is, Canntab doesn’t need to spend millions to build out massive facilities, because they’re set to get a piece of everybody else’s deal. Yes, they can develop and sell their own products, and they’re doing just that, but they don’t need to build a massive sales and marketing team, or raise a ton of money at terrible interest rates, they can simply charge others a licensing fee and either let them use the tech, or sell them a white labeled product, or use them to sell their own branded SKU.

Canntab can bring that technology to anyone who wants it, for a price, and if you check their newsflow right now, that’s exactly what they’re doing. The runs are on the board. Their men are on base, and all that’s needed is a quick single to turn those deals into hard revenue, and without the onerous expense that most cannabis companies have in setting up their facilities, and trying to sell their products to consumers, through the government, without actively marketing themselves.

Canntab doesn’t have any of that bother. The risks, have been largely removed. The have money in the bank and a stock that’s held up well and all they have to do now is deliver deals with existing companies that have a lot more on the line.

There are not many companies in the cannabis space that own the rights to an entire product category. Canntab does.

I believe that we’ll see these products in drugstores, and the people that currently don’t look at cannabis products because they’re not going to walk into a dispensary, eventually, will get into this in a big respectable and ongoing way.

For years we’ve talked about getting pain and anxiety meds out of nursing homes and giving the oldies a simple pill to bliss them out, and for some reason we’re still ‘making do’ with the idea they’ll take edibles.

Grandma needs her pills. Canntab has got Grandma’s back.

— Chris Parry

FULL DISCLOSURE: Canntab is an Equity.Guru marketing client.