Sugarmade Bets Larger HQ on Cannabis Growth

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Sugarmade Bets Larger HQ on Cannabis Growth
Oceanwide Plaza

The legal cannabis market is expected to grow by leaps and bounds, and has already has caused one local company to move to larger quarters.

Sugarmade Inc., a publicly-traded cannabis industry supply company, recently moved its business operations to Monrovia from the City of Industry. Sugarmade’s new space is a suite at 750 Royal Oaks Drive, a two-story, 45,000-square-foot campus about two blocks north of the 210 freeway.

The company has said it expects revenue growth of at least 400 percent during this year. Its new location will consolidate its operations under one roof.

“We do not have nearly enough room at our current City of Industry location to accommodate the growth we are already realizing and are expecting for 2018 and beyond,” said Jimmy Chan, Sugarmade’s chief executive, in a statement. “While hundreds of cultivation licenses have already been issued, there is still a significant backlog, which bodes well for us throughout 2018 and beyond.”

Sugarmade had its initial public offering in 2016. Last year, the company announced it had signed a contract with Duarte-based BizRight, a manufacturer and distributor to the cannabis industry.

The legal marijuana industry itself is projected to nearly quadruple in size nationally, reaching $24.1 billion in sales by 2025 from 2016’s $6.6 billion –a compound annual growth rate of 16 percent, according to a report by Washington, D.C.-based cannabis industry research group New Frontier Data.

The medical marijuana market segment, worth $4.7 billion in 2016, is expected to grow to $13.3 billion by 2025, New Frontier Data said. Recreational marijuana sales are expected to grow 21 percent per year frame to reach $10.9 billion over the same time from $1.9 billion.

California legalized marjuana in 2016.

New Frontier Data Chief Executive Officer Giada Aguirre de Carcer said in a statement that the state’s legal marijuana industry “is forecast to grow from $2.8 billion in 2017 to $5.6 billion in 2020.”

Well-Designed

Celebrity fitness expert and nutritionist Harley Pasternak shall collaborate with the Beijing-based Oceanwide Holdings on wellness programming at Oceanwide Plaza at 1101 S. Flower St. in downtown Los Angeles.

Pasternak, author of “The Body Reset Diet” and “The 5-Factor Diet,” will design the fitness spaces and curate a wellness lifestyle for owners at the massive South Park development, a mixed-used project with residential and commercial components.

A statement from Pasternak called the partnership a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Oceanwide Plaza is near Staples Center and the LA Live complex, will include three towers; 340 condominiums, a 184-room Hyatt Hotels Corp. Park Hyatt Los Angeles, a 164-unit Park Hyatt Los Angeles Residences, a 166,000-square-foot retail space and a two-acre park.

Partner Growth

Proskauer Rose added to its Century City-based real estate law practice by hiring Don Melamed and Albert Stemp as partners. Melamed previously worked at O’Melveny & Myers. Stemp comes from Hogan Lovells, where he had worked since 2014.

Expansion

Westside-based nonbank lender iBorrow has opened offices in Seattle and Dallas and hired Ryan Kurth and Matt Hood to oversee them.

Brian Good, iBorrow’s chief executive, attributed the need for new offices to “numerous loans” originated in the Pacific Northwest, Texas and Oklahoma.

Staff reporter Ciaran McEvoy can be reached at [email protected] or (323) 556-8337.

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