Wednesday, October 17, 2018

10 AM - 10:45 AM - Herscher Hall - Guerin B

The Business of Cannabis: Banking – Investment – Branding – What’s Legal and Not Legal in California

Jay Purcell, Senior Associate, Clark Neubert LLP

Senator Robert Hertzberg, California State Senate

Lillian Conroe, Small Business and Permit Specialist, Governor Brown's Office of Business and Economic Development, GO-Biz

Matthew S. Schweber, General Counsel, Avalon Bridge Capital, Inc.

Mitchell Berman, Managing Partner, Rise Entertainment, LLC, Moderator

Mitchell Berman, Managing Partner, Rise Entertainment: Mitchell Berman is a 30-year entertainment and technology media veteran, who has participated in the launch of 6 start-ups and a successful IPO. These initiatives span social enterprise, mobile/PC games, streaming OTT video, e-commerce, education technology, video-on-demand, interactive television, cable and satellite entertainment television channels, digital music, YouTube influencer channels, augmented & virtual reality, and subscription-based entertainment products and services. Currently, Mitch serves as managing partner at Rise Entertainment LLC, focused on mentoring Southern California entrepreneurs and managing investments in early to mid stage companies that intend to make a cultural impact in the digital world. Mitch has previously served in various senior management capacities with Home Box Office (HBO/Cinemax), E! Entertainment

Television, Sky Network Television New Zealand, Galaxy Media/East Coast Pay TV (FOXTEL Australia), OpenTV, C-COR, ZillionTV Corporation and Berman Strategic Advisors. Mitch is a frequent speaker at domestic and international industry conferences, serves as a member of the International Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, an advisory board member and judge for the UCLA Social Enterprise Academy, a board member of the Silicon Beach Young Professionals, a strategic advisor to the Auckland Tourism, Events & Economic Development/Auckland Mayor’s Office and New Zealand Consul General in Los Angeles.  Mitch earned a master’s degree in Public Administration from the University of Southern California (USC) and a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA).

Senator Robert Hertzberg, California State Senate: In November 2014, Bob Hertzberg was elected to serve nearly 1 million residents of the San Fernando Valley. In the Senate, Hertzberg chairs the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Water. Hertzberg previously was the 64th Speaker of the California State Assembly, twice unanimously elected to the post in 2000 and 2002. During his 12 years in the private sector, Hertzberg remained deeply committed to public policy, replacing Leon Panetta as Co-Chair of “California Forward” from 2009-2012 and served as a founding member of The Think Long Committee of California formed under the auspices of the Berggruen Institute on Governance.  Hertzberg has served on the boards of the Public Policy Institute of California, Pepperdine University School of Public Policy, Claremont McKenna Rose Institute of State and Local Government, The USC Price School of Public Policy, and the Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy.  He also twice served as Chair of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation in 2004 and 2011.  In addition,  Hertzberg served as chairman of the Transition Teams for Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in 2005  and as a member of the transition team for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. While in the private sector between his stints in the legislature, Hertzberg co-founded two renewable energy companies and won multiple awards as a result, including the Wall Street Journal Award for Innovation in 2005, being recognized by the UK’s The Guardian magazine as one of the “50 People Who Could Save the Planet”, and While in the private sector between his stints in the legislature, Hertzberg co-founded two renewable energy companies, winning the Wall Street Journal Award for Innovation in 2005, was recognized by the UK’s Guardian Magazine as one of the “50 People Who Could Save The Planet,” and winning the World Bank Award for Lighting Africa for a project in Rwanda. The Los Angeles Times said this about Bob Hertzberg: “He is a high-velocity wonk; he loves BIG ideas and will flesh out every one of them if you give him a chance.”  The Daily News has said:  Hertzberg “has a relentless dedication and indefatigable energy – he has a reputation for integrity and perseverance.”  During his time in government, Hertzberg is known for working on the biggest and toughest issues facing California, often behind the scenes without putting his name on legislation.  For example, he negotiated a breakthrough in a 16-year deadlock relating to School Construction finance – resulting in millions of dollars for new schools as Assembly Speaker. His other notable work as Assembly Speaker included reforming the California budget process to avoid gridlock, reforming the initiative process, and redistricting reform – eliminating gerrymandering of California districts. Now back in the Senate, he has been working for years on the very difficult issue of reforming California’s volatile tax structure, fixing California’s unjust bail system, and working on important technology issues including blockchain, among many other matters. Mr. Hertzberg has two sons: David, 28, and Daniel, 26. David is a Juilliard graduate, who is the Composer in Residence for Opera Philadelphia and has had performances at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center and the Lincoln Center. Daniel is a graduate of Goucher College in Baltimore who works as a sales executive at a major hotel in Long Beach. Hertzberg is one of five brothers.

Lillian Conroe is the Small Business and Permit Specialist for the California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) that provides assistance to new and existing small businesses in California. Lillian was appointed by Governor Jerry Brown in September 2012. Prior to her appointment, Lillian worked for Cal Recycle as the supervisor of the Waste Tire Enforcement and Permitting of the landfill/lea units.  Lillian got the opportunity to travel to Mexico with the Boarder 2012 Task Force. Previously, Lillian was the director of the Business Revitalization Center (BRC), a one stop permit assistance center in Los Angeles which provided permit assistance to businesses rebuilding after the 1994 earthquake.  Lillian also worked in collaboration with the city and county agencies building of the Staple Center and Kodak Theater. Lillian’s career started with the Employment Development Department (EDD) as a job service representative working with ex-felons and long term unemployed to find employment.

Matthew S. Schweber is the General Counsel of Avalon Bridge Capital, Inc., a Canadian merchant bank that makes strategic investments in cannabis startups and spearheads initial public offerings for portfolio companies on the Canadian Stock Exchange. He is also the founder of Schweber Law, P.C. and Seven West Consultants, LLC-- a legal practice and consulting firm, respectively, devoted to equipping cannabis companies with the legal advice, business acumen, political insight, and the financial capital necessary to navigate the unavoidable obstacles that come with operating in an industry bedeviled by conflicting laws, inchoate regulations, punitive tax liability, and exclusion from basic banking services. Matt began representing cannabis clients in 2011, following fifteen years as a commercial litigator at Cravath Swaine & Moore, Davis Wright Tremaine, Weil Gotshal, and Paduano & Weintraub. Since then, he has advised cultivators, dispensaries, manufacturers, and ancillary service companies on state laws and regulations; has drafted state licensing applications; has lobbied New York state representatives on behalf of sick patients to expand New York’s Compassionate Care Act; and has guided angel investors and venture capital firms through the due diligence and compliance review preceding large capital investments.  Among his clients, Matt has represented and/or advised DCM Ventures, Ribbit, Tokken, Rev Genomics, Smoke Signals, Serica Pay, the Canalyzer, Nutritional High, NanoSpheres Health Sciences, Flying Eagle Advisors, CannaScore, CannaRegs, Holistic of Arkansas, AllCann, Aeon Wellness, GuGu, TOKR and NewLeafIQ. In addition to his legal and consulting work, Matt has taught classes on the Constitutional authority individual states possess to legalize marijuana and has moderated New York City Bar Association panels on cannabis law and policy.   A former fellow in Columbia’s Graduate Writing Program, he also has published articles on American history and literature in Dissent, Crosscurrents, and Salon and written exhaustively about the intersection between politics, illicit drugs, and professional sports. Matt received his B.A. summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University, and he obtained a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Jay Purcell is a corporate and securities lawyer who graduated from UC Berkeley School of Law in 2011. His practice focuses on negotiating and drafting partnership, financing and merger/acquisition agreements for cannabis businesses. In a rapidly-changing legal environment, Jay’s goal is providing the most accurate and actionable advice to cannabis companies and their investors. At Clark Neubert LLP, Jay represents high-growth cultivators, manufactures, distributors and dispensaries throughout California, and the investors who back them. Counseling all types of California corporations, he regularly advises collectives/cooperatives and non-profit mutual/public benefit corporations on conversions and acquisition strategies. Prior to working in cannabis, Jay worked as a corporate attorney for tech companies. Beginning at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, he was trained to represent growth-companies from “idea to exit,” concentrating on financial transactions, employment incentives, commercial agreements and mergers/acquisitions. Representative clients included Google Ventures, Founders Fund, DIA Styling, FireEye, Curse, SurfAir and companies that were sold to Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. In 2016, Jay transitioned to a full-time cannabis practice, where the goal remains the same: helping little companies become big companies. While at Berkeley, Jay won a fellowship from the Center for Emerging and Neglected Diseases, helped organize a global IP collaboration for access to essential medicines, externed at Berkeley’s Office of Intellectual Property & Industrial Research Alliances and won an American Jurisprudence Prize. He’s a member of the board of directors of the Berkeley Law Alumni Association. Prior to California, Jay graduated with honors from Cornell University, first as a College Scholar and triple-major in the College of Arts & Sciences, and then from its Graduate School, where he won a Sage Fellowship and State Department Foreign Language grant (Swahili). Jay splits time between Clark Neubert’s San Francisco and Santa Monica offices.