Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. All right,
Speaker 1: So this past weekend, Tim, we saw pride marches around
Speaker 1: the country. We saw marches for women's rights falling Friday's
Speaker 1: abortion ruling. We also honored Juneteenth just one week ago. Today,
Speaker 1: we're thinking a lot about issues of equality and all
Speaker 1: of its configurations and gaps. And so to his Colorful Capital,
Speaker 1: which was launched earlier this month. It's got a mission
Speaker 1: of delivering capital and support to what they describe are
Speaker 1: undervalued business leaders in the l g b t Q
Speaker 1: plus community. We're very pleased this afternoon to be joined
Speaker 1: by Bill Burke are, chief executive officer of TIP, the
Speaker 1: Investment Integration Project. Bill joining us on the phone from
Speaker 1: New York City. Bill, how are you do well? Pleasure
Speaker 1: be here, guys, Yeah, it's great. Great to have you
Speaker 1: with us. Talk to us a little bit about what
Speaker 1: you're doing at Colorful Capital and how you're finding, uh,
Speaker 1: the the talent of the lgbt Q plus community. Yeah,
Speaker 1: sure so so Coloso Capital. We're launching it twenty million
Speaker 1: dollar venture fund. Um really targeting investing in scalable, early stage,
Speaker 1: venture backable enterprises led by lgbt Q plus founders and leaders.
Speaker 1: And the whole kind of investment thesis is really around
Speaker 1: this idea that these these kinds of founders that represent
Speaker 1: these different segments of the community are kind of routinely
Speaker 1: undervalued um by the venture capital space for all sorts
Speaker 1: of reasons. So that's really what we're trying to say
Speaker 1: is like, look, there's these kinds of founders typically have
Speaker 1: less access to early stage capital. They says, all sorts
Speaker 1: of discrimination when raising capital, and this kind of leads
Speaker 1: to this underfunding of viable businesses that both friends and
Speaker 1: family UM and seed stages. And that's essentially what Colorful
Speaker 1: Capitals next to is we want to step in there. So, Bill,
Speaker 1: how do you see it playing out? Because money is
Speaker 1: one thing, right crucial for anybody who's starting up a business,
Speaker 1: especially if they can't bootstrap it. But I mean it's
Speaker 1: also the network that you know, I think about investors,
Speaker 1: whether Sin Silicon Valley or Angel investors bring along with
Speaker 1: them to help these companies, these start ups you know,
Speaker 1: become something. Oh yeah, So I mean that's also part
Speaker 1: of what we've been thinking about too, right, So it's
Speaker 1: this whole idea of saying, when you have um folks
Speaker 1: that are kind of routinely overlooked, so you're not just
Speaker 1: bringing capital to the table, but you're also kind of
Speaker 1: starting from this position, at least for Megan and I,
Speaker 1: where we are members of the community and so we
Speaker 1: kind of already approached this from a unique position of trust,
Speaker 1: and so as part of that position of trust, it's
Speaker 1: also saying, yeah, we're gonna come up with capital, but
Speaker 1: we're also we also have a big roster adventure advisors
Speaker 1: that essentially will come rides shotgun with us to essentially
Speaker 1: provide a lot of the kind of sector expertise and
Speaker 1: all sorts of the scaffolding and support that's necessary to
Speaker 1: ultimately help enable success for these founders and the enterprises.
Speaker 1: So we're doing that a lot of that work to say,
Speaker 1: like we may be focused on seed and precede, but
Speaker 1: there's also kind of the angel rounds and then there's
Speaker 1: subsequent rounds and making sure that we're collaborating with others
Speaker 1: of the industry to make sure that people really see
Speaker 1: this as a kind of spectrum, as a value chain
Speaker 1: that they can slot into and that we can be
Speaker 1: useful in all sorts of ways beyond just saying, hey,
Speaker 1: here's a check. We're going to also try to really
Speaker 1: um invest significantly and really provide the kind of support
Speaker 1: that is otherwise kind of missing. Right now, Hey, Bill,
Speaker 1: talk to us about the LPs here and where where
Speaker 1: you're raising the money from. We understand where the money
Speaker 1: is going, but where are you getting it? Yeah? Ultimately,
Speaker 1: I mean so like with any venture fund, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's gonna be a combination of our kind of network
Speaker 1: where Megan and I essentially come from. I don't know
Speaker 1: what extent impact investment is a can be a bit
Speaker 1: of a progative term right now, um, but we come
Speaker 1: from the impact investment, impact investigating, and sustainable finance world.
Speaker 1: So a lot of the networks that will be leveraging
Speaker 1: to bring into this in terms of LPs, but also
Speaker 1: venture advisors and others are going to really come from
Speaker 1: that world. So it's going to be a combination of
Speaker 1: family offices, foundations, endowments, folks that essentially are are looking
Speaker 1: at this with a very kind of impactful lens in
Speaker 1: some cases, but others that are saying, look, we see
Speaker 1: this untapped opportunity. So we want to really get aggressive
Speaker 1: here um and so really trying to leverage that entire world,
Speaker 1: but then go beyond it. So so that will include
Speaker 1: other members to the teacher plus community, UM and well beyond. Well, okay,
Speaker 1: so let's talk a little bit about you know, when
Speaker 1: you are having these conversations raising funds, what are the
Speaker 1: conversations that you're having that say, Okay, you know, obviously
Speaker 1: these people want to support your mission at Colorful Capital,
Speaker 1: but at the same time, they want to see a
Speaker 1: return on their investment. So so talk to us about
Speaker 1: the data that you have that says, okay, these types
Speaker 1: of investments are going to return outside returns based on
Speaker 1: a benchmark. Oh. Absolutely, Yeah, so this is part of
Speaker 1: the whole thing, right, this has to look, taste, and
Speaker 1: smell like traditional VC exactly what it is. So there's
Speaker 1: a lot of studies that have come out that essentially
Speaker 1: point to the fact that diverse teams lead to outside returns,
Speaker 1: particularly in the context of VC, and so there's all
Speaker 1: you know, depending on which the you points to, it
Speaker 1: can lead to improve risk management, increased I r R.
Speaker 1: So there was this one study that talks about a
Speaker 1: tempercent increase in diversity and DC fields at one point
Speaker 1: five percent increase in I R r UM. Others points
Speaker 1: to increase valuation. So this is mind you, a lot
Speaker 1: of this is also speaks to the problem. There's not
Speaker 1: a lot of studies that points specifically to LGBTQ plus community,
Speaker 1: but you can use proxies, right and so for one
Speaker 1: of them, they talk about for gender balanced teams, step
Speaker 1: up valuations for thirteen percent higher than teams with less
Speaker 1: than ten percent women in leadership. So stuff like that
Speaker 1: where you can start to get together this kind of
Speaker 1: tapestry that shows, look, this is a really promising thing. Um,
Speaker 1: it will lead to outside returns and guess what, it's
Speaker 1: routinely overlooked and undervalue. So that's where we can kind
Speaker 1: of essentially help bring that to the four. Well, great
Speaker 1: to hear what you're up to. Bill Burkhard he is
Speaker 1: a CEO of t i P, the Investment in the
Speaker 1: Integration Project. He's also co founder of Colorful Capital. Joining
Speaker 1: us on the phone in New York City. So about
Speaker 1: two weeks ago, The Bloomberg noted that the US cannabis
Speaker 1: markets is expected to reach forty billion and expected to
Speaker 1: expand at a compound annual growth rate of nearly fIF
Speaker 1: over that time. That's a new report, Tim, that's up
Speaker 1: by grand View Research. Growth driven at least this report
Speaker 1: said by increased legalization. Okay, so with this increased legalization,
Speaker 1: how are people who are using cannabis using it? Well,
Speaker 1: Curely just got some new data. They did this survey
Speaker 1: with Harris poul and it found that of adults who
Speaker 1: are over the age of twenty one who have ever
Speaker 1: consumed cannabis, they've actually done so for health and wellness purposes, Carol,
Speaker 1: as opposed to well, you know, recreational, I would suppose.
Speaker 1: All right, so let's get to our guests with us.
Speaker 1: Is Stacia Woodcock. She is clinical cannabis pharmacistic Curely joining
Speaker 1: us via zoom in New York City. So tell us
Speaker 1: a bit more about how people are using it, because
Speaker 1: we do see growth, um Stacia in the industry. So
Speaker 1: tell us a bit more though about specifically where people
Speaker 1: are using it and for what reasons. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I think, um this survey really helped clear up a
Speaker 1: lot of the stigmas around nding cannabis. People think that
Speaker 1: it's for escapism. For you, know, fun recreational purposes, But
Speaker 1: what we're really seeing is it, by and large, the
Speaker 1: people that are consuming cannabis are doing so for help
Speaker 1: and wellness. It's for stress, it's for anxiety, it's for sleep.
Speaker 1: And the bigger takeaway is it over half of these
Speaker 1: people are using cannabis instead of pharmaceuticals. And I think
Speaker 1: one thing the COVID nineteen pandemic did was sort of
Speaker 1: shift people towards more UM natural homeopathic sort of remedies,
Speaker 1: and cannabis falls into that for a lot of people.
Speaker 1: How are they using it? Not not? What are they
Speaker 1: using it for? How are they using it? Are they
Speaker 1: eating edibles? Are they smoking it? Or are they Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean, I think that's the most fascinating fascinating thing
Speaker 1: about it. People think cannabis, they think smoking UM. Smoking
Speaker 1: is actually bad for you, no matter what it is.
Speaker 1: So we see a lot of vaporization UM and I
Speaker 1: think that's a good opportunity to remind people that we're
Speaker 1: talking about legal, regulated products, and these are products that
Speaker 1: are sold through legal state markets. They're tested, they don't
Speaker 1: have pesticides, they don't have continent eminence, there's nothing else
Speaker 1: in these vaporized products other than pure cannabis oil and
Speaker 1: the turpenes found within the plant um. That's really important
Speaker 1: because illicit market products are not regulated that way. We're
Speaker 1: seeing a lot of contaminated products, so these regulated products
Speaker 1: are are much safer for people to consume. But we're
Speaker 1: also seeing the pharmaceutical industry technology brought into cannabis. So
Speaker 1: if you think of a traditional cannabis edible that takes
Speaker 1: like an hour to kick in and can last for
Speaker 1: eight hours, we can change that with nanoformulation that makes
Speaker 1: cannabis easier to be absorbed by the body, so you
Speaker 1: can consume it in a beverage in a gummy formation.
Speaker 1: It's going to work in like fifteen minutes and only
Speaker 1: last for an hour or two. So people can really
Speaker 1: customize the products that you're they're using to the symptoms
Speaker 1: that they're looking for. If you want to sleep all night,
Speaker 1: you can use something that's gonna last all night. If
Speaker 1: you just need something for anxiety or stress, right now,
Speaker 1: we have products for that too. So the versatility of
Speaker 1: the products really determined sort of what you're using them for.
Speaker 1: So tell me, though, stay so who should be using it,
Speaker 1: because when you say homeopathic and I know there's been um,
Speaker 1: you know, a lot moving forward in terms of greater
Speaker 1: oversight of homeopathic remedies, but I mean, you know, I
Speaker 1: want transparency. I want to know what I'm kind of
Speaker 1: getting into. Yeah. Absolutely. I think one of the things
Speaker 1: that we see a lot are people that are comfortable
Speaker 1: with the idea of cannabis for cancer, for multiple sclerosis,
Speaker 1: for Parkinson's disease, like these really severe disease states, and
Speaker 1: there's a lack of understanding that it actually can be
Speaker 1: utilized for things like arthritis, for menstrual cramps, for migraines,
Speaker 1: for stress, for anxiety. I mean, we have patients and
Speaker 1: consumers coming in all the time for much simpler symptoms,
Speaker 1: and even more importantly, not all cannabis causes euphoria. I
Speaker 1: think that's also a huge misunderstanding that if you use
Speaker 1: cannabis you're going to be stoned. That's absolutely not the case.
Speaker 1: The products come in a lot of different formulations, doses, ratios,
Speaker 1: so we can really customize what you're getting and how
Speaker 1: it's going to affect you for your lifestyle. But I
Speaker 1: guess what I wanted to go back to is remind
Speaker 1: me where we are in terms of FDA oversight of
Speaker 1: all of this. There's yeah, there is no FDA oversight
Speaker 1: right now. It's all state by state regulated UM. But
Speaker 1: that's where that regulation comes into place. So the testing,
Speaker 1: the formulations, all of that is essentially pharmaceutical grade UM
Speaker 1: even without FDA oversight. Do we get to a point
Speaker 1: where there is that FDA oversight or we get to
Speaker 1: a point where you know, I'm actually going to my
Speaker 1: primary care physician and she or he is recommending that
Speaker 1: I go to the pharmacy and pick up some cannabis,
Speaker 1: not going to you know, a dispensary exactly. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean that would require federal, federal legalization, and that's something
Speaker 1: I think the industry is definitely moving toward UM because
Speaker 1: access is huge. Like right now, UM, someone who is
Speaker 1: a patient in New York, say they can't travel to
Speaker 1: a different state legally with their medicine UM, and that's
Speaker 1: a problem. So we need that accessibility to open up
Speaker 1: UM for people to be able to consume and have,
Speaker 1: you know, whatever they're using it for, to be able
Speaker 1: to cross state lines, have consistent product UM. You know,
Speaker 1: that's all something we're moving toward. But I think, you know,
Speaker 1: removing the stigma and seeing what people are using it
Speaker 1: for is a huge step in that direction. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of fear and um miseducation and misunderstanding around cannabis,
Speaker 1: and I think the more transparent we are about why
Speaker 1: people are using it really helps more people get on
Speaker 1: board with the idea that this this really is something
Speaker 1: that people are utilizing or utilizing it safely and it's
Speaker 1: really helping them. Well, yeah, and I do wonder like
Speaker 1: I certainly have tapped into it on the cosmetics side,
Speaker 1: and I know we've had some guests on whether it's
Speaker 1: bombs and you know, lip things and so on and
Speaker 1: so forth. That's more than just CBD, Carol, it's like
Speaker 1: actual cannabis or is it CBD? That's a good question.
Speaker 1: I think it's just CBD. So this is different. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is different. This is this is the actual Well,
Speaker 1: how would you explain the difference, statia, because so it's tricky.
Speaker 1: So cbd um is a cannabinoid, which are the active
Speaker 1: ingredients found in cannabis. Hemp is cannabis um. It's just
Speaker 1: a term that we use for cannabis that grows with
Speaker 1: very little th HC in it. But it's still a
Speaker 1: cannabis plant hemp UM, but we differentiate by calling it
Speaker 1: hemp cbd. That's what can be sold over the counter,
Speaker 1: and that has no FDA oversight for testing requirements or
Speaker 1: regulations at all UM, and so that's where that can
Speaker 1: be really tricky. I always say use hemp cbd with caution. UM.
Speaker 1: The cannabis products and dispensaries come from cannabis that contains
Speaker 1: varying amounts of th HC, and almost all of the
Speaker 1: states regulated much more strictly than hemp cbd, which really
Speaker 1: has no oversight. UM. There are a lot more rigorous
Speaker 1: testing requirements, and what we're seeing now trending. I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people they know about th HC and
Speaker 1: cb D as the two main active ingredients, but there's
Speaker 1: over a hundred different cannabinoids in the plant. So there
Speaker 1: we call them the minor cannabinoids th h C, V
Speaker 1: C B G, C b N, and almost all of
Speaker 1: them are non euphoric and can be used to support
Speaker 1: different sort of health and well in needs. So we're
Speaker 1: seeing even bigger friends shifting towards these minor cannabinus. Right,
Speaker 1: people can take almost like a supplement UM without euphoria,
Speaker 1: and they can just help keep their body in balance. Well,
Speaker 1: this conversation reminds us that we're still learning a lot
Speaker 1: along the way. Doctor Stacia would Coux, she's clinical cannabis
Speaker 1: pharmacist of Cure Leaf, joining us via zoom from New
Speaker 1: York City. I mean, you know, Tim, we've been talking
Speaker 1: about it for years. We've seen it play out in
Speaker 1: the financial markets, but it does feel like it still
Speaker 1: has a ways to go. Regulators, if you're listening, federally
Speaker 1: got crypto, you get cannabis. We got a lot of
Speaker 1: thing happens first. Maybe al right, guys, that's gonna do
Speaker 1: it for this Monday for Tim's Dantavik in the Houl
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week team. Good to be back, Have a
Speaker 1: safe evening. This is Bloomberg.