Mr. Chu has co-founded and held leadership positions at companies in the cannabidiol (CBD) cannabis industry, including HEY MARY and Canna Candys. In addition, Mr. Chu has served as co-founder of High Desert Group and Boom Energy NYC. He has served as Managing Director, Johnny Rockets NYC, Chairman and CEO, iSWIMBAND, co-Founder, Mobile123 and VIAONE Technologies, co-Founder and co-CEO, Urban Wireless, and Vice President, Regal China Cruises.
Paul Chu attended the University of Southern California – Marshall School of Business. He has served as President of IDV – Hansen Beverage Company, where he launched the distribution network that introduced the Southern California fresh juice company, to 13 states along the northeast seaboard. Mr. Chu also formulated and began the “Fresh Squeezed Juice and Monster caffeinated beverage” movement in the Northeast, successfully placing product into SYSCO Foods, 7-Eleven and New York City’s Gourmet Markets.
Mr. Chu co-developed the first prepaid telecom platform, pioneering a digitally built and managed master distributor of mobile phones and prepayments which generated over $750M within four years of inception. Paul has secured placement of products into big box retailers including Walmart, Toys R Us, and Staples. He is the founder of HEY MARY, the first Artificial Intelligent-driven platform for in-home personal cannabis dosing and dispensing.
Richard Carleton was appointed CEO of the Canadian Securities Exchange in July 2011. During his tenure, Richard and the CSE team led a re-capitalization of the exchange in 2012-2013 and established relationships with key influencers in the Canadian securities industry and beyond. These efforts positioned the exchange to take a leading role in the provision of public capital to entrepreneurial companies; from 2014 on, the CSE set a series of records for new listings, capital raised by issuers and trading turnover. An early advocate for the cannabis industry, the CSE is now the global exchange leader in the listing of issuers in the space. Recognized by the Financial Post Magazine as one of Canada’s “25 Cannabis Industry Power Players”, and a recipient of the American Trade Association’s “Captain of Industry” Award in November 2018, Richard is a frequent speaker on early stage company finance issues around the world.
A member of the Law Society of Upper Canada since 1987, Richard is a graduate of the University of Ottawa (B.A. ’81) and the University of Toronto (LL.B. ’85). He has also completed the executive development programme at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
Based in Houston, Alan leverages his experience as founder of online community 420 Investor, the first and still largest due diligence platform focused on the publicly-traded stocks in the cannabis industry. With his extensive network in the cannabis community, Alan continues to find new ways to connect the industry and facilitate its sustainable growth. At New Cannabis Ventures, he is responsible for content development and strategic alliances. Before shifting his focus to the cannabis industry in early 2013, Alan, who began his career on Wall Street in 1986, worked as an independent research analyst following over two decades in research and portfolio management. Alan is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and a frequent source to the media, including the NY Times, the Wall Street Journal, Fox Business, and Bloomberg TV, and currently writes a column for Forbes.