VC Funding for LGBTQ+, Cannabis for Wellness

which was launched earlier this month. It's got a mission of delivering capital and support to what they describe are undervalued business leaders in the l g b t Q plus community. We're very pleased this afternoon to be joined by Bill Burke are, chief executive officer of TIP, the Investment Integration Project. Bill joining us on the phone from New York City. Bill, how are you do well? Pleasure be here, guys, Yeah, it's great. Great to have you

with us. Talk to us a little bit about what you're doing at Colorful Capital and how you're finding, uh, the the talent of the lgbt Q plus community. Yeah, sure so so Coloso Capital. We're launching it twenty million dollar venture fund. Um really targeting investing in scalable, early stage, venture backable enterprises led by lgbt Q plus founders and leaders.

And the whole kind of investment thesis is really around this idea that these these kinds of founders that represent these different segments of the community are kind of routinely undervalued um by the venture capital space for all sorts of reasons. So that's really what we're trying to say is like, look, there's these kinds of founders typically have

less access to early stage capital. They says, all sorts of discrimination when raising capital, and this kind of leads to this underfunding of viable businesses that both friends and family UM and seed stages. And that's essentially what Colorful Capitals next to is we want to step in there. So, Bill, how do you see it playing out? Because money is one thing, right crucial for anybody who's starting up a business,

especially if they can't bootstrap it. But I mean it's also the network that you know, I think about investors, whether Sin Silicon Valley or Angel investors bring along with them to help these companies, these start ups you know,

become something. Oh yeah, So I mean that's also part of what we've been thinking about too, right, So it's this whole idea of saying, when you have um folks that are kind of routinely overlooked, so you're not just bringing capital to the table, but you're also kind of starting from this position, at least for Megan and I, where we are members of the community and so we kind of already approached this from a unique position of trust, and so as part of that position of trust, it's

also saying, yeah, we're gonna come up with capital, but we're also we also have a big roster adventure advisors that essentially will come rides shotgun with us to essentially provide a lot of the kind of sector expertise and all sorts of the scaffolding and support that's necessary to ultimately help enable success for these founders and the enterprises.

So we're doing that a lot of that work to say, like we may be focused on seed and precede, but there's also kind of the angel rounds and then there's subsequent rounds and making sure that we're collaborating with others of the industry to make sure that people really see this as a kind of spectrum, as a value chain that they can slot into and that we can be useful in all sorts of ways beyond just saying, hey,

here's a check. We're going to also try to really um invest significantly and really provide the kind of support that is otherwise kind of missing. Right now, Hey, Bill, talk to us about the LPs here and where where you're raising the money from. We understand where the money is going, but where are you getting it? Yeah? Ultimately, I mean so like with any venture fund, I mean, it's gonna be a combination of our kind of network

where Megan and I essentially come from. I don't know what extent impact investment is a can be a bit of a progative term right now, um, but we come from the impact investment, impact investigating, and sustainable finance world. So a lot of the networks that will be leveraging to bring into this in terms of LPs, but also venture advisors and others are going to really come from

that world. So it's going to be a combination of family offices, foundations, endowments, folks that essentially are are looking at this with a very kind of impactful lens in some cases, but others that are saying, look, we see this untapped opportunity. So we want to really get aggressive here um and so really trying to leverage that entire world, but then go beyond it. So so that will include

other members to the teacher plus community, UM and well beyond. Well, okay, so let's talk a little bit about you know, when you are having these conversations raising funds, what are the conversations that you're having that say, Okay, you know, obviously these people want to support your mission at Colorful Capital, but at the same time, they want to see a

return on their investment. So so talk to us about the data that you have that says, okay, these types of investments are going to return outside returns based on a benchmark. Oh. Absolutely, Yeah, so this is part of the whole thing, right, this has to look, taste, and

smell like traditional VC exactly what it is. So there's a lot of studies that have come out that essentially point to the fact that diverse teams lead to outside returns, particularly in the context of VC, and so there's all you know, depending on which the you points to, it can lead to improve risk management, increased I r R. So there was this one study that talks about a tempercent increase in diversity and DC fields at one point five percent increase in I R r UM. Others points

to increase valuation. So this is mind you, a lot of this is also speaks to the problem. There's not a lot of studies that points specifically to LGBTQ plus community, but you can use proxies, right and so for one of them, they talk about for gender balanced teams, step up valuations for thirteen percent higher than teams with less than ten percent women in leadership. So stuff like that where you can start to get together this kind of

tapestry that shows, look, this is a really promising thing. Um, it will lead to outside returns and guess what, it's routinely overlooked and undervalue. So that's where we can kind of essentially help bring that to the four. Well, great to hear what you're up to. Bill Burkhard he is a CEO of t i P, the Investment in the Integration Project. He's also co founder of Colorful Capital. Joining

us on the phone in New York City. So about two weeks ago, The Bloomberg noted that the US cannabis markets is expected to reach forty billion and expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate of nearly fIF over that time. That's a new report, Tim, that's up by grand View Research. Growth driven at least this report said by increased legalization. Okay, so with this increased legalization, how are people who are using cannabis using it? Well,

Curely just got some new data. They did this survey with Harris poul and it found that of adults who are over the age of twenty one who have ever consumed cannabis, they've actually done so for health and wellness purposes, Carol, as opposed to well, you know, recreational, I would suppose. All right, so let's get to our guests with us. Is Stacia Woodcock. She is clinical cannabis pharmacistic Curely joining

us via zoom in New York City. So tell us a bit more about how people are using it, because we do see growth, um Stacia in the industry. So tell us a bit more though about specifically where people are using it and for what reasons. Yeah, you know, I think, um this survey really helped clear up a lot of the stigmas around nding cannabis. People think that

it's for escapism. For you, know, fun recreational purposes, But what we're really seeing is it, by and large, the people that are consuming cannabis are doing so for help and wellness. It's for stress, it's for anxiety, it's for sleep. And the bigger takeaway is it over half of these

people are using cannabis instead of pharmaceuticals. And I think one thing the COVID nineteen pandemic did was sort of shift people towards more UM natural homeopathic sort of remedies, and cannabis falls into that for a lot of people. How are they using it? Not not? What are they using it for? How are they using it? Are they eating edibles? Are they smoking it? Or are they Yeah? I mean, I think that's the most fascinating fascinating thing

about it. People think cannabis, they think smoking UM. Smoking is actually bad for you, no matter what it is. So we see a lot of vaporization UM and I think that's a good opportunity to remind people that we're talking about legal, regulated products, and these are products that are sold through legal state markets. They're tested, they don't have pesticides, they don't have continent eminence, there's nothing else in these vaporized products other than pure cannabis oil and

the turpenes found within the plant um. That's really important because illicit market products are not regulated that way. We're seeing a lot of contaminated products, so these regulated products are are much safer for people to consume. But we're

also seeing the pharmaceutical industry technology brought into cannabis. So if you think of a traditional cannabis edible that takes like an hour to kick in and can last for eight hours, we can change that with nanoformulation that makes cannabis easier to be absorbed by the body, so you can consume it in a beverage in a gummy formation. It's going to work in like fifteen minutes and only

last for an hour or two. So people can really customize the products that you're they're using to the symptoms that they're looking for. If you want to sleep all night, you can use something that's gonna last all night. If you just need something for anxiety or stress, right now, we have products for that too. So the versatility of the products really determined sort of what you're using them for.

So tell me, though, stay so who should be using it, because when you say homeopathic and I know there's been um, you know, a lot moving forward in terms of greater oversight of homeopathic remedies, but I mean, you know, I want transparency. I want to know what I'm kind of

getting into. Yeah. Absolutely. I think one of the things that we see a lot are people that are comfortable with the idea of cannabis for cancer, for multiple sclerosis, for Parkinson's disease, like these really severe disease states, and there's a lack of understanding that it actually can be utilized for things like arthritis, for menstrual cramps, for migraines, for stress, for anxiety. I mean, we have patients and consumers coming in all the time for much simpler symptoms,

and even more importantly, not all cannabis causes euphoria. I think that's also a huge misunderstanding that if you use cannabis you're going to be stoned. That's absolutely not the case. The products come in a lot of different formulations, doses, ratios, so we can really customize what you're getting and how it's going to affect you for your lifestyle. But I guess what I wanted to go back to is remind me where we are in terms of FDA oversight of

all of this. There's yeah, there is no FDA oversight right now. It's all state by state regulated UM. But that's where that regulation comes into place. So the testing, the formulations, all of that is essentially pharmaceutical grade UM even without FDA oversight. Do we get to a point where there is that FDA oversight or we get to a point where you know, I'm actually going to my primary care physician and she or he is recommending that I go to the pharmacy and pick up some cannabis,

not going to you know, a dispensary exactly. Yeah, I mean that would require federal, federal legalization, and that's something I think the industry is definitely moving toward UM because access is huge. Like right now, UM, someone who is a patient in New York, say they can't travel to a different state legally with their medicine UM, and that's a problem. So we need that accessibility to open up UM for people to be able to consume and have, you know, whatever they're using it for, to be able

to cross state lines, have consistent product UM. You know, that's all something we're moving toward. But I think, you know, removing the stigma and seeing what people are using it

for is a huge step in that direction. There's a lot of fear and um miseducation and misunderstanding around cannabis, and I think the more transparent we are about why people are using it really helps more people get on board with the idea that this this really is something that people are utilizing or utilizing it safely and it's

really helping them. Well, yeah, and I do wonder like I certainly have tapped into it on the cosmetics side, and I know we've had some guests on whether it's bombs and you know, lip things and so on and so forth. That's more than just CBD, Carol, it's like actual cannabis or is it CBD? That's a good question. I think it's just CBD. So this is different. Yeah, this is different. This is this is the actual Well, how would you explain the difference, statia, because so it's tricky.

So cbd um is a cannabinoid, which are the active ingredients found in cannabis. Hemp is cannabis um. It's just a term that we use for cannabis that grows with very little th HC in it. But it's still a cannabis plant hemp UM, but we differentiate by calling it hemp cbd. That's what can be sold over the counter, and that has no FDA oversight for testing requirements or regulations at all UM, and so that's where that can

be really tricky. I always say use hemp cbd with caution. UM. The cannabis products and dispensaries come from cannabis that contains varying amounts of th HC, and almost all of the states regulated much more strictly than hemp cbd, which really has no oversight. UM. There are a lot more rigorous testing requirements, and what we're seeing now trending. I think a lot of people they know about th HC and cb D as the two main active ingredients, but there's

over a hundred different cannabinoids in the plant. So there we call them the minor cannabinoids th h C, V C B G, C b N, and almost all of them are non euphoric and can be used to support different sort of health and well in needs. So we're seeing even bigger friends shifting towards these minor cannabinus. Right, people can take almost like a supplement UM without euphoria, and they can just help keep their body in balance. Well, this conversation reminds us that we're still learning a lot

along the way. Doctor Stacia would Coux, she's clinical cannabis pharmacist of Cure Leaf, joining us via zoom from New York City. I mean, you know, Tim, we've been talking about it for years. We've seen it play out in the financial markets, but it does feel like it still has a ways to go. Regulators, if you're listening, federally got crypto, you get cannabis. We got a lot of thing happens first. Maybe al right, guys, that's gonna do it for this Monday for Tim's Dantavik in the Houl

Bloomberg Business Week team. Good to be back, Have a safe evening. This is Bloomberg.