Category Archives: Uncategorized

i502 Traceability system replacement – quick update

Published June 15, 2017 / by bde / 1 Comment on i502 Traceability system replacement – quick update
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Hi guys. Just a quick and dirty post before I head out to go paint a cabin. I’ve had email back and forth and phone calls with an MJ Freeway account representative this week. I have a link to a full demo of their platform that I have yet to watch. I did not get a demo, but spoke with the rep for about 20 minutes. Here are my takeaways:

  • MJ Freeway was just made aware of this last week, just like the rest of us. They are scrambling to put a plan together. This is a little scary.
  • They will develop/support/maintain an open API to allow 3rd party integration as mandated by the LCB. When I mentioned that it seemed like METRC pulled their bid because they locked people into their RFID technology, and asked how they dealt with this, he said they are committed to maintaining an open API as the state mandates and will be working on a plan for this in the coming days/weeks.
  • I expressed my concern over the timeline for implementation – and also asked why the state mandates October rollout. He didn’t know either. I still  don’t really understand the motivation behind the October hard date for replacement of Biotrack. Does anyone know why October is so important?
  • I’ve sent follow up email asking for a call with a technical resource or product manager to get a more in depth overview of their platform, architecture, and underlying framework. Also to discuss their plans for backwards compatibility, maintaining the existing biotrack API, and how they plan to maintain/extend it with their own API approach/model.

NET TAKEAWAY: I am still deeply concerned about the viability of this massive software rip and replace project that the LCB has mandated. We already had a less than stellar list of initial vendors who submitted bids. We lost the first one because they tried to lock us into their proprietary technology and hardware. Now we are left with the “next best vendor” – ok who’s in second? Ok. Here we go again.

More later.

Franwell pulls bid to replace Biotrack for WA State i502 Recreational Cannabis Traceability System

Published June 9, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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Well, it looks like enough people spoke up to the LCB and they listened. I received the following Email from LCB yesterday regarding Franwell and their decision to pull the bid for the contract to replace Biotrack.

This is only a SMALL win. WE STILL DESPERATELY NEED A BETTER SYSTEM THAN BIOTRACK. MY NEW CONCERN: DOING THIS BY OCTOBER!!!

After spending 15 years in the Enterprise software space, I was involved in a number of large scale integration, migration, upgrade, and “rip and replace” style software development projects. These projects are costly, messy, and never go according to plan.

Why is LCB in such a rush to implement a new system by October? If this mandate stands, there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY TO IMPLEMENT A ROBUST SOLUTION for a project at this scale. Especially one that aspires to do a full rip and replace with a standard, dev/test/release cycle in between. These types of projects take 18-24 months at best, let alone 4 months.

4 month dev cycle. With a government project?
ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?
##

Text from letter from LCB:

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Attention Licensees: The below message was sent yesterday by Deputy Director Peter Antolin to licensees who had written to the Board and staff regarding the marijuana traceability Apparent Successful Vendor and RFID tags.

June 7, 2017

On behalf of the Liquor and Cannabis Board, thank you for writing recently to express your concerns about the change in vendors for the state traceability system and specifically RFID tags.

RFID Not Required
The WSLCB will not require RFID as part of the marijuana traceability project. Our Request for Proposal (RFP) was clear that the marijuana seed-to-sale traceability system must support a variety of tagging methodologies such as bar codes, RFID, etc. The RFP requirements did not allow a vendor to make any assumptions regarding use of a single tagging methodology or allow vendors to include any such costs affecting the state or our licensees in their proposal. In addition, unique plant and inventory identification numbers will be centrally created, maintained, and made available to third-party software systems via the API. Licensees will also be able to print their own labels.

Traceability Advisory Group
As the WSLCB prepared the RFP, we engaged representatives of the major industry trade organizations. We held several meetings together to gather input and clearly communicate our intentions. At the most recent meeting held June 6, we again asked that the representatives of the Traceability Advisory Group communicate with their members about this important point.

Change in Apparent Successful Vendor
As we have indicated, the Apparent Successful Vendor (ASV) was not final until contract negotiations were complete and a contract was signed. Earlier today, the initial ASV, Franwell, withdrew its proposal for Washington State. An ASV is the procurement term used for the highest scoring, responsive vendor.

We are pleased to notify you that the second place bidder also submitted a strong bid and has accepted our choice to be the new ASV. MJ Freeway is the new ASV. We will soon schedule a product demonstration with our Traceability Advisory Group and begin contract negotiations quickly to get this project implemented.

Timeline
This project is on a tight timeline. The new traceability system must be in place Oct. 31, 2017. We are taking the necessary steps now to ensure a smooth transition from the current system to the new one.

Thank you again for writing the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board.

Brian E. Smith
Communications Director
Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board
360-664-1774

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New WSLCB Dashboard built on Socrata Framework

Published May 24, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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Today the WSLCB released a new Monthly Dashboard for access to the public data for i502. I started poking around and they are using a cloud based data provider based in Seattle named Socrata (http://socrata.com). I just started poking around and while the framework has a STEEP learning curve, luckily I spent almost 2 decades banging my head against the wall trying to learn and use the vast majority of these kinds of frameworks when I worked in the Enterprise Software space. I’m going to use this post as a test bed to see if the “embed” features actually work. To be continued… BDE

PS – had a great meeting today with Cannasol Farms right across the valley in Riverside. More on that later.

Hello World… should display Extract Conversions table

Powered by Socrata

Izzy’s list – Angie’s List and BBB for the Cannabis Industry

Published March 17, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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This Uline bullshit got me thinking about how hard it is for cannabis businesses to get fair and equal treatment as legitimate business entities.

Putting my information, library science, and software development skills to good use, I decided to start a curated list of Third Party Vendors. These will be businesses that most cannabis companies would benefit from, by having a vetted list of vendors with ratings, reviews, and personal contacts that are here to help listen and meet your needs without all the bullshit and red tape we typically see across the industry at large.

This is in a primordial state of even a pre-alpha release, but I wanted to get started on it right away, and am making it public from the start.

I have an idea for a solid, scalable framework for the list/catalog and will see how much I can code up on my flight home.

If you have suggestions, feature requests, or legitimate cannabis friendly third party vendors, contractors, anyone who you need to operate, and grow your business, please comment on this post, or drop me a DM.

Izzy’s List

#eisenetics #izzyslist #b2b #angieslistforcannabis #BBBforcannabis #supplychain #businesstobusiness #cannabis #marijuana #recreationalweed #legalweed
#hacker #devops #cloud #b2b
#ifyoubuildittheywillcome

Alaska Alcohol and Marijuana Control Seizes CBD products from legal marijuana shops.

Published February 10, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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Alaska Marijuana Control Board raids marijuana shops for CBD products.

UPDATE: 2/10/2017 @ 11:47PM PDT: I just learned that the shops that were raided purchased CBD products from out of state that had no test results and were selling them under the regulated system, which is against the MCB regulations. These were isolated incidents pursued by the enforcement division of MCB. There is NO statewide ban on CBD products in legal marijuana shops. That being said, the fact that health food shops can sell CBD products purchased from out of state but Marijuana shops can’t seems illogical, and again, a double standard.  While this is a relief, there will most certainly be more issues and action with respect to CBD products and how/where you can purchase them legally.

What a bunch of BS. Time to make some phone calls to my contacts up north. I agree that all cannabis-derived CBD products should go through the same scrutiny and testing as everything else, but to single out Marijuana businesses selling CBD, while allowing it to be sold in health food stores is complete bullshit.

News Source: https://www.adn.com/alaska-marijuana/2017/02/09/state-seizes-cbd-products-from-marijuana-stores/

Here are some contacts you can reach out to and voice your opinion:

Alaska Alchohol and Marijuana Control Board Web site: https://www.commerce.alaska.gov/web/amco/home.aspx

Email: You can email the MCB at the following email address. NOTE: all emails will become part of the public record. marijuana@alaska.gov 

Marijuana Control Board Members – https://www.commerce.alaska.gov/web/amco/MCBMembers.aspx

Each of the members below can be reached via the main phone line (ask operator to connect or lookup in directory) –

Phone: (907) 269-0350. The only option I found where I could leave a voicemail was for the administrative office at Option 7. I left a voicemail asking for the email and phone contact information for the board members below. I will update this post if/when I get this information.

Position Name Type Location
Chair Man Peter Mlynarik Public Safety Soldotna
Member Mark Springer Rural Public Bethel
Member Loren Jones Public Health Juneau
Member Brandon Emmett Industry Fairbanks
Member Nicholas Miller Industry Anchorage

Office locations:

Fairbanks
1648 Cushman St., Suite 203
Fairbanks, AK 99701
Phone (907) 451-2748
Amanda Stonecipher, Investigator III

Juneau
State Office Building, 9th floor
333 Willoughby Ave
Juneau, AK 99801
Phone (907) 465-2330
Steven Johnson, Investigator III

Anchorage
550 West 7th Ave, Suite 1600
Anchorage, AK 99501
Phone (907) 269-0350

Office Hours:
Mon – Fri 9:00 am – 4:00 pm
Closed over Lunch Hour 12-1
Closed Sat. – Sun.
and all State Holidays.

Cannabis industry folks, don’t sit back and let the uneducated make questionable legal decisions without being properly informed and educated on the issue at hand. Please take some time to contact the folks above and give them your opinion on CBD-related products.

BDE -∞+

An industry in limbo: Recreational Pot in 2017

Published February 8, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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What will the new Administration in Washington DC do?

With recent changes in Washington DC, the future remains uncertain for the fledgling Recreational Cannabis industry across the nation. Time will tell if our incoming Attorney General, Jeff Sessions will go after the cannabis industry. My gut tells me they won’t, but that’s coming at it from a logical standpoint, and from what I’ve seen so far coming from DC,  logical deduction and hard facts seem to have been tossed into the dumpster.

Given the dollar amounts we are talking about in terms of taxes generated ($185 million in FY2016 for WA state), and the ensuing lawsuits that would follow, coupled with the enormous negative economic impact (jobs and productivity lost – especially in rural areas), I genuinely hope the incoming AG respects states’ rights and does not interfere with the legal Cannabis industry.

Changes in Washington State

Here in Washington state, there are a number of interesting proposed changes coming out of Olympia this session that would have a significant impact on the industry at large.

HB 5102 – Out of state ownership and investment

The first change has to do with allowing outside sources of funding (non WA residents) for i502 Businesses. Currently there are funding and lending restrictions that limit the amount of investment capital can flow in from outside the state. House Bill 5102, clarifying residency requirements for licensed marijuana businesses, has been introduced and is in committee. There is a public hearing scheduled for

The key changes in verbiage in HB5102 have to do with limiting the percentage ownership by out of state interests to 50% ownership and allowing “managers or agents” aka owners who are exempt from the residency requirement.

…with the exception that only those holding fifty percent of all ownership interests must meet the residency requirement;

A person whose place of business is conducted by a manager 21 or agent, unless the manager or agent possesses the same 22 qualifications required of the licensee, with the exception of the residency requirement.

Source: http://app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary?BillNumber=5102&Year=2017

HB 1092 – Allowing “Home grows”

House Bill 1092 would amend the i502 Legislation to allow any Washington state resident 21+ years old to cultivate up to 6 marijuana plants and possess up to 24 ounces of dried plant material from the personal cultivation. For any single residence if there are 2 or more adults 21+ or older, you may have up to 12 plants and 48 ounces of dried plant material. You may only leave your residence with up to an ounce of “home grown” at a time.

(4)(a) Subject to the requirements in this subsection (4), the possession by a person twenty-one years of age or older of no more than six marijuana plants and up to twenty-four ounces of useable marijuana harvested from lawfully grown plants is not a violation of this section, this chapter, or any other provision of Washington state law, provided:
(i) The plants are grown and possessed only within the premises of the housing unit in which the person resides; and
(ii) The useable marijuana has been harvested from plants lawfully grown within the premises of the housing unit in which the person resides and is not removed from the premises in amounts exceeding one ounce.
(b) No more than twelve marijuana plants and forty-eight ounces of useable marijuana may be possessed, in the aggregate, by the adult residents of a single housing unit, regardless of the number of persons twenty-one years of age or older residing in the housing unit.
(c) This subsection (4) does not apply to marijuana plants or useable marijuana possessed at a location other than the premises of the housing unit in which the marijuana plants were lawfully grown.

Source: http://lawfilesext.leg.wa.gov/biennium/2017-18/Pdf/Bills/House%20Bills/1092.pdf

Regardless of where you stand on legal cannabis, please take a minute to acknowledge that there are tens of thousands of business owners, employees, and fellow Washingtonians who are pouring their blood, sweat, and tears into being successful in this industry. As we have in the past, we continue the journey into uncharted waters. Onward we go!

BDE -∞+

Eisenetics Rebooted for 2017

Published January 14, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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I created this site as a place where I can drop some of my knowledge and experience working in the Recreational and Medical Cannabis industries for nearly 30 years. I expect to incorporate video, pictures, graphs, charts, data tables, business analysis, market and product breakdowns, and anything else I find of interest and relevant to the industry.

Be sure to hit me up on social media where I am most active on Instagram (@eisenetics) and Snapchat (@eisenetics).

–BDE

Calling out shady Producers and Processors

Published January 14, 2017 / by bde / Leave a Comment
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I’ve seen my fair share of shady business in i502 and elsewhere in the black, grey, medical, and recreational markets, but this latest blatent disregard for the consumer has me shaking my head. Check out this “wanted” post on the 502data.com site – http://502data.com/kushguidewanted

 

So let me get this straight, there are processors looking to somehow broker deals for flower lots that failed to meet the state testing criteria and extract it into “live resinprocessors”? I thought all lots that failed testing/analysis had to be destroyed. This CLEARly doesn’t benefit the consumer. Shame on you shady Producers and processors. I’m coming for you. The data doesn’t lie.