America has a tradition of banning things, and then unbanning them and welcoming them to the mainstream. Boardroom gender rights and embargoed booze during prohibition spring to mind. This makes it doubly interesting to watch tradition face off with medical marijuana, and see the innovation legalization is bringing to it.
Take the recent TechCrunch Disrupt knockout held in San Francisco this September for example. This competition celebrates the successes of disruptive businesses. These are firms turning the world upside down as Uber is doing to the taxi industry. If they had one for countries, the winner would probably be China. The 2015 TechCrunch Disrupt award went to an online greenhouse hydroponics system. Is anybody out there listening in the MMJ business?
First runner-up is even closer to the interests of this blog. In fact, MMJ delivery company Green Bits was bang on the button with its point of sale solution running off an iPad. “I am deeply honored to have made it to the TechCrunch Disrupt Battlefield finals,” said Ben Curren, its founder and CEO. It doesn’t get much more c-suite that that, does it?
This takes my thinking back to a Business Insider post I traced in August. There, Ms Biz Carson expounded on the modern MMJ wonders Eaze and Meadow that deliver medical marijuana door-to-door the same way Mr. Delivery could satisfy your Kentucky Chicken craving if you wanted to. Do you think someday when potheads have their way – as they will indeed – it will be possible to find a smoking pal the same way as an Uber ride, but I digress.
Ms Carson is more interested in mainline technology solutions, and so she should when writing for Business Insider. It’s therefore apt she mentions Serica Pay. This uses the blockchain method to record and track each medical marijuana purchase, and provides an easygoing way for MMJ venture capitalists to accept online payments without giving bank managers headaches.
Debra Borchardt took an even more businesslike approach in Forbes earlier this year. She focused on three MMJ applications for three very mainline services for small to medium businesses. Leafly provides Yelp-like opportunities for reviewers, while Weedmaps offers daily special ‘groupon’ coupons.
Aspirant MMJ farmers can even hire a hand to operate their online greenhouse hydroponics system on Weedhire. And to think there was such a fuss, when California voters decided to allow the medical use of marijuana in 1996.