Aurora Cannabis Inc. is a Canadian licensed producer of medical cannabis headquartered in Vancouver, BC, with additional offices in Edmonton, Pointe-Claire, and Toronto. It is the second largest federally regulated, publicly traded cannabis producer in Canada, and trades on the Toronto Stock Exchange as ACB. As of May 2018, Aurora is the fastest growing cannabis company in North America, and is licensed by Health Canada under the Access to Cannabis for Medical Purposes Regulations (ACMPR) and in the European Union under the Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) certification.
By April 2018, the company had a market value of C$4.5 billion; revenue in 2017 totaled C$31.1 million. At the time, the company was concluding its takeover merger of previous competitor CanniMed Therapeutics. The takeover was finalized in January 2018, based on a C$1.1 billion deal. The subsequent plan to purchase MedReleaf would make the company the largest in Canada with market capitalization of approximately $7 billion.
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About
Aurora was founded in 2013 by Terry Booth, Steve Dobler, and Chris Mayerson. Booth invested $2.5 million of his own capital in start-up funding to secure a 100+ acre parcel of land in Cremona, Alberta, where alongside his business partners he established Aurora's first facility. The company received its licence to grow cannabis in 2014, making it the first cannabis producer to obtain a federal licence in that province.
Aurora's line of products includes whole-flower cannabis, milled cannabis, cannabis oils, and vaporizers. The company provides same-day and next-day delivery options, and offers Compassionate Pricing to those who qualify. Their client care team based in Vancouver, BC, provides 12 hours a day of customer support via phone, live chat, and email.
As of March, 2018, Aurora serves over 40,000 registered active patients in 3 countries, and has over 500 employees; its rate of client acquisition is faster than any other company in the cannabis industry.
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History
Aurora's first facility, located in Cremona, Alberta, was completed in 2014. Booth decided to establish the company in Alberta because of low corporate tax rates compared to other provinces as well as farm credit programs. On November 27, 2014, Health Canada issued Aurora's licence to sell medical cannabis. On January 10, 2017, Aurora received a licence from Health Canada to sell cannabis oils, having been granted a licence to produce the oils in February, 2016. Sales of four product lines of cannabis oils commenced in April, 2017.
Products
Testing
All products from Aurora facilities are gamma-irradiation and pesticide free, and all third party laboratory results are displayed on the company's website and mobile app. Since March, 2017, Aurora allowed public access to a simplified Certificate of Analysis (CoA) for every cannabis product available for sale on the company's online store and mobile app. The system was developed in partnership with Anandia Labs Inc, a Canadian cannabis genetics and testing laboratory.
Dried Flower
Aurora sells whole-flower cannabis, carrying strains of varying levels of THC and CBD. In the past the company has produced and sold strains with THC and CBD content levels over 32% and 24% respectively. Aurora is currently working with Canadian licensed producers Broken Coast (based in Ladysmith, BC) and 7ACRES (based in Tiverton, ON) who are known for their small-batch selection.
Oils
Aurora's line of cannabis oils (known as Aurora Drops) range in high to low levels of THC and CBD, as well as 1:1 oils that hold equal parts THC and CBD. The company also occasionally produces strain specific oils, using extracts from a single Aurora strain rather than a blend of multiple strains. Aurora uses CO2 extraction to create cannabis extracts which are then blended with MCT oil, a naturally occurring substance found in coconut oil. MCT oil was chosen because it is efficiently absorbed by the body.
DMD
In late 2017, Aurora began selling milled cannabis products known as double milled decarboxylated (DMD) cannabis. These are high potency products that can be ingested without the need to smoke or vaporize the cannabis. The company also sells a Capsule Bundle which allows consumers to make their own capsules using DMD cannabis and vegan/plant-based capsules.
Vaporizers
Aurora sells and ships a range of vaporizers through a third party distributor, Namaste.
Corporate Affairs
Overview
Aurora is widely recognized for the speed with which it captured and maintained market share, having grown from 0 registered clients in January 2016 to more than 12,000 by the end of that year. During that same time, the company increased quarterly revenues from $0 to $3.9 million for the last quarter of 2016 while also increasing its market cap from $80 million to more than $800 million.
Aurora was the first to launch same-day and next delivery and the first to bring that service to two major urban centres. Same-day and next-day delivery services continue to account for more than 75% of shipments into the Calgary, Edmonton, and the surrounding communities.
In February, 2018, Aurora launched Aurora Pro, a corporate account program and business-to-business service designed to facilitate and accelerate market development for producers and retailers of cannabis.
Management Team
- Terry Booth - CEO & Co-founder
- Steve Dobler - President & Co-founder
- Chris Mayerson - Director of Genetics & Co-founder
- Cam Battley - Chief Corporate Officer
- Neil Belot - Chief Global Business Development Officer
- Glen Ibbott - Chief Financial Officer
- Allan Cleiren - COO
- Darryl Vleeming - Chief Information Officer
- Savior Joseph - Senior VP Global Marketing
- André Jérôme - Senior VP Business Integration
- Jillian Swainson - Senior VP & General Counsel
- Nick Whitehead - VP Market Development
- Deiter MacPherson - VP Production
Board of Directors
- Michael Singer - Chairman of the Board
- Diane Jang - Director
- Terry Booth - Chief Executive Officer and Director
- Steve Dobler - President and Founder
- Jason Dyck - President and Head of Research Council
- Adam Szweras - Director
Growing facilities
Aurora Mountain
Aurora Mountain is Aurora's first facility, completed in 2015. It is a 55,200-square-foot production facility in Mountain View County that is fed with water from the Canadian Rocky Mountains. The facility does not use pesticides or gamma-irradiation but rather tiny natural predators to attack pests that prey on marijuana plants. As of November 2016, a proposed expansion of the facility is under development.
Aurora Vie
Aurora Vie is a 40,000-square-foot, fully licensed, indoor production facility in Pointe-Claire, Quebec. It is only the second licensed producer in Canada's second most populous province, and was acquired in 2017 for $7 million when it was about 80% complete. The facility has since been completed, and features $3 million in configuration and technology upgrades specifically designed to meet EU GMP certification standards. Aurora Vie will produce approximately 4,000 kg of cannabis annually, and features many cultivation and automation technologies that the company is implementing at its Aurora Sky facility.
Aurora Sky
In 2017, Aurora Cannabis began construction of an automated 800,000-square-foot plant in Alberta that will be capable of producing 100,000 kilograms of cannabis annually. When completed, it will be the largest facility of its kind in the world. The greenhouse features the world's first industrial-scale plant-tissue culture process specific to cannabis. The land is part of the acreage owned by the Edmonton International Airport.
Aurora Eau
Aurora is currently completing a fourth facility in Lachute, Quebec through its wholly owned subsidiary Aurora Larssen Projects Ltd.
Aurora Nordic
On January 4, 2018, it was announced that Aurora had signed a binding term sheet for the formation of a joint venture pursuant to which Aurora will ultimately own a 51% interest in Aurora Nordic Cannabis, which will be based in Odense, Denmark. Upon completion of the agreement, Aurora Nordic will commence construction of an ALPS (Aurora Larssen Projects Ltd) designed, 1,000,000 square foot high-technology, fully automated cannabis production facility.
Aurora Sun
On April 16th, 2018 it was announced that Aurora was acquiring approximately 71 acres of land in Medicine Hat, Alberta, where the company intends shortly to commence construction of a 1.2 million square-foot hybrid greenhouse cannabis production facility. To this end, Aurora has signed a memorandum of understanding with the City of Medicine Hat, concerning terms and a general understanding of potential transactions, including a prospective 10-year, 42 MW energy supply agreement. The project will be over 21 football fields, and over 50% larger than Aurora Sky.
Mobile Application
Aurora's mobile application was launched in 2016 and was the first legal app for Android and Apple that allowed you to buy federally-approved medical cannabis online. A second version was released in 2017 with features including push notifications, fingerprint authorization, and performance improvements.
Acquisitions and expansion
Overview
2017 saw an unprecedented period of growth for Aurora with an extremely long list of acquisitions as a result of extensive financing, including 5.0% Unsecured Convertible Debentures; the largest bought deal financing in the Canadian cannabis sector.
As of March, 2018 Aurora holds approximately 9.6% of the issued shares (12.9% on a fully diluted basis) in leading extraction technology company Radient Technologies Inc., based in Edmonton, and is in the process of completing an investment in Edmonton-based Hempco Food and Fiber for an ownership stake of up to 50.1%. In May, 2018 Aurora increased their ownership to 52.7%.
As of December 31, 2017 Aurora's cash plus marketable securities exceed $500 million.
Australian and European expansion
Aurora is the cornerstone investor with a 22.9% stake in Cann Group Limited, the first Australian company licensed to conduct research on and cultivate medical cannabis. In 2018, Cann Group was granted a licence to import/export cannabis genetics and medicinal cannabis products by the Australian government's Department of Health through the Office of Drug Control (ODC).
Aurora also owns Pedanios GmbH, a leading wholesale importer, exporter, and distributor of medical cannabis in the European Union, based in Berlin, Germany. Between March and November, 2017 approximately 13,000 people in Germany applied for reimbursement of their medical cannabis prescription, with a 65% approval rate. In December 2017 alone, approximately 7,500 people applied for reimbursement through the insurance company AOK Versicherung, implying a national figure of 15,000 for all of Germany within a single month. Pedanios is the EU's largest distributor of cannabis by volume of product sold, and continues to build market share rapidly; as of March, 2018 it is the only distributor to offer cannabis flowers sourced from both Canada and the Netherlands.
In January, 2018 Aurora became the first private company to be granted a supply agreement to the Italian market through its German subsidiary Pedanios. Aurora announced on January 23, 2018 that the first tender would consist of three lots of different cannabinoid profiles totalling 100 kg.
CanniMed takeover
On November 13, 2017, Aurora Cannabis delivered an all-stock takeover bid to CanniMed Therapeutics's board of directors, which became public on November 14. It claimed that it had the support of 38% of shareholders. CanniMed management responded by rejecting the offer, and proposed an alternative merger with Newstrike Resources, a recreational cannabis firm, instead. CanniMed also enacted a "poison pill" to fend off the acquisition by enacting a rights plan that would allow CanniMed shareholders to vote on the Newstrike deal. On November 20th, Aurora launched a hostile takeover bid for CanniMed, conditional on shareholders rejecting the Newstrike deal.
The Ontario Securities Commission intervened in this, the first major hostile takeover bid in Canada's cannabis industry, ordering Aurora Cannabis Inc. to provide more disclosure regarding any ties to individuals "in a special relationship" with target CanniMed Therapeutics Inc. and blocking CanniMed from adopting the so-called "poison pill" defence. The ties were deemed unfounded by the Securities Commission. On January 17, 2018, Newstrike shareholders approved the proposed merger. On January 18, CanniMed postponed its shareholder vote on the Newstrike deal, submitting that it will hold talks with suitor Aurora Cannabis. On January 24th, it was announced that Aurora Cannabis finally hammered out a deal to acquire CanniMed Therapeutics Inc. for $1.1 billion, and CanniMed dropped its plans to acquire Newstrike.
In March, 2018, Aurora completed their acquisition of Cannimed, with both parties agreeing to the transaction on friendly terms. This agreement brought Aurora's total patient count to 40,000 registered cannabis patients in Canada.
MedReleaf takeover
In mid-May 2018, the company announced a planned friendly takeover of MedReleaf in a $3.2 billion stock deal already approved by the directors of both companies. The deal still required approval by shareholders and government regulators. After the takeover is completed, the company will be able to produce 570,000 kilograms of cannabis at its nine grow operations in Canada and two in Denmark, if it uses all of the available capacity. The value of the new company could be as high as $7 billion, making it substantially larger than Canopy Growth Corporation with its market cap of $6.45 billion. It would have distribution agreements in a number of countries, including Germany, Italy, Brazil and Australia.
Subsidiaries
Aurora's subsidiaries include Pedanios Gmbh (Germany's largest distributor of cannabis to pharmacies), CanvasRx (the largest medical cannabis patient outreach service in Canada), BC Northern Lights (an indoor growing supplies manufacturer), Aurora-Larssen Projects (a globally leading greenhouse engineering and design consultancy), and H2 Biopharma (a late-stage ACMPR applicant in Quebec).
References
External links
- Aurora Cannabis Website
- Aurora Sky Overview (plant.ca)
Source of article : Wikipedia
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