Medical cannabis company Satipharm have set up their European operations base in Ireland. The Canadian company is a subsidiary of the Vancouver headquartered parent company Harvest One, who develop a whitelabel range of both CBD oil and capsules. Jonathan Hartshorn, the company's chief executive, explained that Harvest One “decided to reboot” the Satipharm name and “looked around Europe for a suitable location and team”.
He said that Ireland was chosen due to its “favourable tax regime”, proximity to both mainland Europe and North America, along with having an English-speaking environment. Satipharm currently have six staff situated in Dublin and plan to place representatives in other markets as well. “The Satipharm business is run from Ireland. We have strategy, sales, marketing, supply chain, finance. They’re all run from here and we have partners in local service providers in various markets to support that but our core team is here.”
They are already selling CBD oil products in a number of Ireland and UK based chains such as Boots and Lloyds. And, have also recently launched a new capsule product called CBD Gelpell. Just earlier this month the company published the latest clinical trials for Gelpell and how it may be able to treat epilepsy and reduce the frequency of seizures.
Taking on the EU Market
Gelpell is currently produced in Switzerland and then exported to a number of EU countries. On their move to take over the EU market, Hartshorn expressed that it is a ‘unique’ one ‘given its regulatory differences in comparison to Canada and the US’. “For Satipharm, Europe is certainly our key market. We have Satipharm’s Gelpell that is currently restricted to Europe. We’re unable, regulatory wise, to sell that in Canada or America,” Hartshorn said.
“We can only currently make that available in Europe so that is a big push.” For a number of their products, Satipharm will have to make adjustments to their formulas to meet regulations in other countries.
Future success for Satipharm?
Satipharm so far, however, has had a reasonable deal of success in the EU getting two of the most popular chain stores on their side so things here are looking positive. Parent company Harvest One are currently doing extremely well in Canada and the US. The public-listed brand had an impressive revenue of $8.4 million for the nine months ending in March.
Satipharm is just one of the many Canadian companies looking at Ireland and it’s favourable regulations. As just earlier this year Edmonton firm Aurora Cannabis lobbied the Irish government to loosen their regulatory regime around medical cannabis.
