Canopy Growth

Tweed was founded by Bruce Linton and Chuck Rifici in 2013, and renamed Canopy Growth Corporation in 2015 after a merger with Bedrocan Canada.

Bruce Linton was the primary Founder, Chairman and Co-CEO and Mark Zekulin was Co-CEO and President until July 3, 2019, when Linton was ousted from the company. Zekulin became the sole CEO, until later that year a new CEO was announced and Zekulin stepped down on 20 December.Canopy Growth was the first federally regulated, licensed, publicly traded cannabis producer in North America, traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange as WEED. It began trading as CGC on the New York Stock Exchange on May 24, 2018, as the first cannabis producer on the NYSE. On October 17, 2018, marijuana became legal in Canada for recreational use. Canada's first legal cannabis sale was made at midnight by CEO Bruce Linton at a Tweed store in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador.Prior to that date, cannabis was legal only for medical purposes in Canada; growers were licensed by Health Canada under the Access to Cannabis for Medical Purposes Regulations . The company was described as "Canada's first cannabis unicorn with a $1 billion dollar valuation" by the Financial Post news organization in November 2016. The company was renamed to Canopy Growth Corp. in September 2015 with two established brands: Tweed Inc. and Bedrocan Canada Corp. Specifically, CGC is the parent company of licensed cannabis producers Tweed Inc., Tweed Farms Inc., Spectrum Cannabis., as well as newly acquired companies.

Tweed operates out of the former Hershey's chocolate factory in Smiths Falls, Ontario, and operates the Tweed Farms greenhouse in Niagara-on-the-Lake.In provinces where the private sector is allowed to sell cannabis, the company has opened retail stores via its subsidiary Tweed Inc. As of April 2019, Tweed stores were open in Manitoba, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Saskatchewan. Canopy Growth has opened cannabis stores in Manitoba and Ontario under the Tokyo Smoke brand.In June 2018, Canopy Growth funded Professorships in Cannabis Science at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, in conjunction with the British Columbia Centre on Substance Use . By October 5, 2018, the company's market capitalization exceeded US$14 billion and Linton was named 2018 CEO of the Year by the Ottawa Board of Trade and Ottawa Business Journal.

Partnership with Constellation Brands

In August 2018, Constellation Brands – an American beer, wine and spirits producer with global markets – announced its investment of an additional Can$5 billion in Canopy Growth, giving it 38% ownership of the company, up from the previous 10%. President Bruce Linton said the additional funds would be used for international expansion wherever federal laws allow it. Future marketing plans include products such as cannabis-infused beverages and sleep aids. After the Constellation deal was announced, the market value of Canopy Growth rose to nearly US$12 billion. At the end of 2019, when the Canadian cannabis market had declined over the second half of the year, Constellation Brands announced there were no plans to invest further in Canopy Growth, although long-term plans to develop drinkable cannabis products for medical and recreational markets remained in place.

2019 restructuring

News reports indicated that Bruce Linton had been ousted from all of his roles with Canopy Growth and Canopy Rivers, its venture capital division, on July 2, 2019, after an emergency board meeting.This move came a few days after Constellation Brands, which then held four of the seven Canopy board seats and controlled nearly 40% of the firm, expressed dissatisfaction with the cannabis giant's financial results. Significant losses had been reported during its efforts to increase the size of greenhouse facilities in British Columbia and Quebec. The fourth quarter 2018 loss had been much greater than expected, with a net loss attributable to shareholders of $335.6 million, substantially higher than the net loss that had been predicted by analysts. A CTV News report summarized the situation as: "the cannabis company's expenses ballooned, its net loss widened and medical and recreational sales activity slowed from the previous quarter". Constellation Brands president and CEO Bill Newlands made this comment in late June 2019: "... we continue to aggressively support Canopy on a more focused, long-term strategy to win markets and form factors that matter while paving a clear path to profitability".The board left Mark Zekulin to continue as sole CEO and a search was to be conducted for a replacement co-CEO. Rade Kovacevic was named President and John Bell was appointed chairman. As of early July 2019, Linton held 18 million shares of Canopy. In an interview, he told CNBC that he had been "terminated", not "stepped down" as previous reports had suggested. "I was asked to leave, and I left under the terms that we mutually agreed to", he explained.A mid-November 2019 report said that the company's stock "slid more than 17% Thursday ... after the company posted weaker-than-expected earnings for its fiscal second quarter". By that time, cannabis stocks in general had "crumbled to their lowest level since 2017" according to an October 2019 report.On 9 December 2019, the company announced a new CEO, David Klein, previously executive vice president and chief financial officer at Constellation Brands and Canopy Growth's chair. . Interim CEO and co-founder Mark Zekulin was to step down before year end; Klein was to assume his new role on 14 January 2020. One news report stated that the appointment of Klein would further entrench Constellation’s influence on Canopy Growth.In December 2020, the company announced that it will close some sites in Canada which can affect the jobs of 220 employees.