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#10YearsofNCIA with Ryan Douglas And Nina Simosko

Tune in to this look-back episode as we wrap up the year 2020 and reflect on #10YearsofNCIA.

Ryan Douglas And Nina Simosko Join us today to help celebrate 10 years of NCIA.

The Hurdles For A Cannabis Startup with Ryan Douglas of Ryan Douglas Cultivation. As Master Grower from 2013 to 2016, he directed cultivation for Tweed Inc., Canada’s largest licensed producer of medical cannabis and the flagship subsidiary of Canopy Growth Corporation. As one of the company’s first employees, he helped drive the organization’s early success by designing the production facility, selecting the genetics, and hiring and training staff to produce 70,000 plants and process 6 tons of dry cannabis annually. His work at Tweed has been featured in Vice, New York Times, Bloomberg News, and on National Public Radio. The cannabis industry in its current form is relatively new and fresh and still quite entrepreneurial. A lot of “start-ups” being formed and launched, especially with every year, new states legalizing medical or adult-use cannabis. There’s a lot of people listening to this show right now who might be launching cannabis businesses in their states soon. We discuss what advice Ryan has as someone who has worked directly with start-ups in the cannabis space. Also, some common challenges or hurdles that start-up operators might not think about.

The Future Of Cannabis As An Essential Business with Nina Simosko. Nina serves as Chief Revenue Officer for Akerna, a global regulatory compliance technology company in the cannabis space. Akerna’s companies and investments also include MJ Freeway, Ample Organics, Last Call Analytics, Leaf Data Systems, solo sciences, and ZolTrain. Nina brings more than 20 years of technology industry experience to her role. We talk about current events, and the good news during all this is that cannabis businesses have been deemed “essential”. But there are some differences in how we’re operating. There’s delivery and curbside pickup etc so we walk through that customer-to-sale process now and how it’s different. Looking even further into the future here, we ask if she is anticipating any further changes than what we’ve already seen. As well as How will dispensaries reach their customers and what will be new and different in how we’re operating in this new normal. Nina is extremely well suited to her current role with Akerna. She oversees all of the company’s revenue generation streams, builds strategies to drive revenue growth, and plays a pivotal role in aligning revenue generation processes across the entire organization.