Net Element (NASDAQ: NETE) management believes that cash transactions are becoming progressively obsolete. The company is in the digital transaction business, with its North American transactions revenue growing to $42.1 million in calendar 2016, up 54% from 2015. Interestingly, for consumer transactions, where restaurants and educational services dominated in 2015, health and beauty was the fastest growing segment last year — accounting for almost 20% of that total business.

Net Element is a global financial services company focusing on processing electronic payments in an omni-channel environment. It has three segments: North American Transaction Solutions, Mobile Payment Solutions, and Online Payment Solutions. In 2016, the North American segment contributed 78% of total corporate revenue of $54.3 million, or ten points higher than in 2015. The company processed $1.6 billion in transactions in this segment in 2016, a 60% increase over its 2015 revenues.

While 48% of Net Element’s processing in North America in 2015 came from restaurants, as its sales team emphasized its Aptito high-technology product line, that figure dropped to 37% last year. In its place was a surge in health and beauty establishment processing. It grew to 19.9% in 2016 from 7.1% in 2015. General merchandise also grew, delivering greater than 15% of all transactions processed last year. Conversely, educational services fell to just 4.4% from 15.9% in 2015.

Net Element has a lot of growth potential in U.S. processing in the health and beauty category. The hair care industry in the U.S. has some 86,000 establishments, including 82,000 beauty salons and 4,000 barber shops, according to a research study titled ‘Beauty Salon Business Overview and Trends, 2014’ (http://nnw.fm/88zsJ). It’s a growing business; revenue is seen reaching $58.7 billion by 2019. Due to the appeal of higher profit margins, industry operators are seen increasing to 1.3 million by 2019. It also sees higher enrollments at cosmetology schools.

For more information, visit www.NetElement.com

The cannabis plant is comprised of, among other things, phytochemicals that have evolved over time to become very biologically active. Most of the current research and development (R&D) surrounding cannabis revolves around understanding these biologically-active ingredients, especially cannabinoids. To date, over 90 cannabinoids have been isolated from cannabis, each affecting the body’s cannabinoid receptors and responsible for distinctive pharmacological effects. The cannabinoids that bind more selectively to certain receptors have become more desirable for medical usage because of the advantage offered. Examples of phytochemicals that have been developed into pharmaceutical drugs include the bronchodilator (asthma), salicin (aspirin) and a number of cardiovascular agents.

InMed Pharmaceuticals is a Canadian drug discovery and development company with a unique focus on this area of cannabinoid science and the curative capabilities of cannabinoids. Since the 1980s, InMed has been developing a robust pipeline of therapies and products by leveraging its primary value drivers: its leadership team and its research and development into the extensive pharmacology of cannabinoids; its proprietary drug discovery platform; its proprietary cannabinoid manufacturing system; and its inventive drug delivery systems.

InMed benefits from the leadership of tested experts like Dr. Ado Muhammed, the company’s Chief Medical Officer. A proven leader in the field of cannabinoid therapies, Muhammed previously served as Associate Medical Director at GW Pharmaceuticals, a $3 billion cannabis biotechnology company. There, he played a strategic role in the delivery of core clinical research and key decision-making regarding R&D and product commercialization. Moreover, he was instrumental in leading that company through the development and regulatory approval of one of the first cannabis drugs in existence. InMed prides itself on being the only cannabis biotech company with a former GW Pharmaceuticals executive on board. This is a significant occurrence, as GW Pharmaceuticals is viewed as “the cannabis industry leader,” as well as a long-term biotech investment with a promising future. Since 2013, GW Pharmaceuticals’ shares have shot up from less than $9 to over $121 as of March 30, 2017, bringing it to a market value of approximately $2.9 billion.

Bioinformatics assessment is another of InMed’s core value drivers. As a general approach, this type of assessment opens up the world for future drug discovery, as it combines scores of data sets and builds holistic models to approach a specific disease. As part of its operations, InMed has created a computer-based program that assists in the discovery of novel cannabinoids using: (a) far-reaching algorithms to integrate data from various bioinformatics databases, (b) a database on the structure of currently-approved pharmaceutical products, and (c) a broad database containing the 90-plus individual cannabinoid drugs that have been found in cannabis. The company is now using this bioinformatics assessment tool to classify bioactive compounds within the cannabis plant that have the potential to have physiological impacts on specific diseases and to, ultimately, identify new drug candidates that heighten the therapeutic benefits of cannabis while restricting its adverse effects.

Biosynthesis — a process used in industrial applications, including the use of bacteria- or yeast-based systems for the production of pharmaceuticals — is also one of InMed’s primary value drivers. InMed is currently building up a high-yield biosynthesis process for manufacturing all 90+ naturally-occurring cannabinoids. This process integrates the inbuilt safety and known effectiveness of natural drug structures with the convenience, control and quality of a laboratory-based manufacturing process. InMed’s proprietary approach to the production of pharmaceutical grade, bio-identical cannabinoids is a disruptive technology in the current and rapidly-emerging cannabinoid pharmaceutical sector.

Along with its proprietary in silico drug/disease bioinformatics assessment tool and its cannabinoid biosynthesis technology, InMed’s drug development pipeline is also a core asset. The company is leveraging a conservative clinical budget and accelerated drug development timelines to target unmet medical conditions using its disease-specific formulations. Presently, the company has two drug candidates in its pipeline:

• INM-750 is under pre-clinical development for the treatment of epidermolysis bullosa, an orphan pediatric disease that is typified by extremely fragile skin. Epidermolysis bullosa has no current approved therapies and represents an estimated $1 billion market.
• INM-085 is under pre-clinical development for the treatment of glaucoma, a severe eye disease with a global market of approximately $5.6 billion.

InMed Pharmaceuticals is also seeking and developing novel drug candidates for the treatment of conditions relating to dermatology, pain and inflammation, metabolic and respiratory diseases, and the ocular region and central nervous system.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.InMedPharma.com

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Grey Cloak Tech, Inc. (OTC: GRCK) is a developer of industry-leading click-fraud detection software designed to overcome the most expensive and devastating threats in the digital world. Through its recently acquired subsidiary, ShareRails, Grey Cloak now also provides sophisticated e-commerce tools that help retailers evolve beyond their brick-and-mortar business practices to increase both their digital engagement and their foot traffic.

ShareRails is an online-to-offline technology firm that provides vitally important services within the trillion-dollar retail sector, helping brick-and-mortar retailers compete directly for online awareness with e-commerce-only brands. Through the ShareRails O2O platform, offline retailers can use online channels to more effectively drive sales and attract new customers.

The innovative solutions offered by ShareRails enable local retailers to capture the millions of online shopping searches they are currently missing out on because their product inventories and other key information is not currently available online and, therefore, does not appear in relevant searches and cannot be viewed digitally.

Most of today’s retail sales are Web-influenced. By utilizing digital marketing channels, merchants can enhance the in-store shopping experience for customers and simultaneously boost sales. The ShareRails O2O platform enables retailers to put their product catalogs online, along with product location and availability, and make the information searchable. The platform also offers digital merchandising tools that include an outfit builder and wishlist app along with conversational shopping tools. Through ShareRails O2O, merchants can additionally tap into data that details shopper insights and behavioral trends. Add-on services include click-n-collect, reservations for in-store pickup, and local delivery.

ShareRails additionally offers Dress.li, which is a recommendation and reward platform that connects shoppers to stylists, bloggers and other fashion influencers who provide them with expert shopping advice and uniquely styled looks and, simultaneously, connects the consumers to fashion retailers. Through Dress.li, the challenge of creating a seamless social shopping experience has finally been mastered! This platform facilitates live shopping communications, curation and content creation and lets users join a global network of trendsetters. Through this network, users can inspire and be inspired, accessing and sharing product recommendations and unique looks and receiving rewards each time another user makes a purchase from their recommendations. This platform not only provides an enjoyable and exciting network for shoppers and fashionistas, but it simultaneously supplies retailers with a lucrative outlet for acquiring new customers through a built-in global sales force of fashion influencers. As these Dress.li stylists create and share looks, they also deliver pre-qualified sales leads and conversions and are rewarded for doing so.

Joined together, Grey Cloak Tech’s industry-leading click-fraud detection solutions and the exciting retail-boosting products delivered through ShareRails offer a broad package of services to both protect businesses in the digital world and help them utilize digital channels to bolster their sales and enhance customer engagement.

Grey Cloak Tech continues to serve as an industry leader in developing the most effective and comprehensive weapons to fight online security threats. The company is keenly focused on protecting its clients’ interests through the identification of fraud patterns at the very earliest stages. When businesses partner with Grey Cloak Tech, they can look forward to benefiting from industry-leading technology, a top-tier client services team, and an augmented bottom line.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.GreyCloakTech.com

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It’s not just the size, but also the demand and margins involved in the alternative lodging rental (ALR) market that are impressive. Providing a platform where travelers can rent private homes and other non-traditional lodging has proved to be disruptive and transformative to the travel industry. The number of users just keeps growing while home owners and travelers mutually benefit, and the platform providers generate enormous revenues due to higher margins.

The obvious elephant in this arena is Airbnb, which has grown from inception 10 years ago to a valuation of more than $30 billion. Because of the size and demand in the ALR market, other players like HomeAway, Priceline, and FlipKey have staked out territory. Airbnb has about 2.5 million ALR listings in inventory, including homes and rooms of private owners. HomeAway has about 1.2 million ALR listings, while Priceline has around a half million and FlipKey has 700,000. However, unlike hotels, each of these platforms relies on the private property owner to provide confirmation to the traveler, a process which can take days to complete. This doesn’t sit well with travelers trying to nail down travel details. In fact, a recent article in tnooz travel (http://dtn.fm/ULTi5) showed that, no matter how much they may like the economy and locational advantages typically offered by alternative lodging rentals, travelers really desire the convenience and ease of one-stop booking and instant confirmation, as provided by travel agencies.

One upstart travel company is about to deliver exactly what customers want and, in the process, could disrupt and transform the ALR market and perhaps the entire travel industry. Technology-driven Monaker Group, Inc. (OTCQB: MKGI) has more than 60 years of operational experience serving the tourism industry. This has given Monaker valuable insights into how to best serve today’s traveler and how to deliver ALR options on customer terms. Through its flagship ALR brand, NextTrip, Monaker currently offers about a million ALR listings with another 1.8 million-plus listings in process to be delivered to the travel industry’s fastest growing sector. More importantly Monaker Group’s unique ALR platform, NextTrip.com, is the only platform to offer travelers real-time booking of ALR properties, plus full access to traditional travel lodgings and transportation options, effectively encompassing everything needed to plan and organize vacations. By combining immediate ALR confirmation with all other travel options such as airlines, cruises, concierge services, and rental cars, Monaker will be able to provide the first true all-in-one online booking site.

The tnooz article also highlighted some other shortcomings of current ALR platforms. Survey results showed that over half of respondents would find it valuable if online travel agencies offered ALR options, while less than five percent of business travelers were given ALR options and a third would utilize ALR if offered. Presciently, Monaker already addressed these consumer concerns by delivering white label, real-time ALR solutions to Mark Travel and another 85,000 independent travel agents, in addition to providing links to over 200 corporations. Monaker facilitates the complexity of multiple bookings with multiple variations through integration with artificial intelligence travel platforms.

Monaker, given such technical and strategic innovations in an enormous market, represents breakthrough potential at a bargain price for investors. The company trades in the small cap market with about 11 million shares outstanding and about 6 million shares in the float. Estimates show unusually high insider ownership at around 68 percent of the company. That rate of insider ownership suggests that management and other insiders are convinced that they are on the cusp of disrupting and transforming the ALR market and reaping huge rewards in the process.

For more information, visit www.MonakerGroup.com

Now that 28 states have passed comprehensive medical marijuana laws, conditions have never looked better for expanding research and development (R&D) into the therapeutic benefits of cannabinoids, which is exactly what InMed Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (CSE: IN) (OTCQB: IMLFF) is doing. Its efforts have already borne results: the company has two novel drug candidates in its pipeline. But there’s more to InMed than meets the eye; the Vancouver, Canada-based company has developed a proprietary process to manufacture cannabinoids based on biosynthesis. In addition, it has constructed an algorithm to identify the cannabinoids most likely to have beneficial therapeutic effect. With this triad of core assets, InMed looks poised to join the ranks of Big Pharma.

Of the 480 or so substances found in the cannabis sativa plant, about 60 are unique to the plant and are called cannabinoids. Perhaps the best known of these is delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is responsible for the ‘high’ derived from marijuana, but cannabinol (CBN) and cannabinodiol (CBDL) will also get you stoned. Most other cannabinoids are not psychoactive and cannabidiol (CBD), the one which occurs the most in the plant (about 40 percent of cannabis resin), actually mitigates the psychoactive effects of THC.

CBD is also known to dispel anxiety, which, according to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (http://dtn.fm/LUjx9), is the most common mental illness in the U.S., afflicting 40 million Americans. Cannabinoid R&D has the potential not only to ease their suffering but the burden of those who suffer from a variety of other ailments.

At InMed, R&D has led to the development of a proprietary process to manufacture cannabinoids. Traditionally, cannabinoid compounds have been isolated by processing and purifying cannabis resin from actual plants. Alternatively, synthetic cannabinoids are created in the lab in a costly, time-consuming process that, in the end, may not produce a substance quite like nature’s. The InMed approach is to apply cannabinoid DNA to E-coli bacteria. The E-coli DNA is then removed leaving just the cannabinoid DNA, which can then replicate, in a process known as biosynthesis.

Although novel as a means of developing cannabinoids, biosynthesis is widely employed in the pharmaceutical industry. For example, the insulin used by millions of diabetics worldwide on a daily basis is manufactured through biosynthesis.

InMed has also created a bioinformatics program that assists in the identification of novel cannabinoids to treat diseases based on the current non-cannabinoid drugs being used. The program uses comprehensive algorithms to integrate data from numerous bioinformatics databases, including a database on the structure of currently approved pharmaceutical products, and an extensive database on over 90 individual cannabinoid drugs found in cannabis.

Using its own proprietary analytics program and manufacturing methodology, InMed has advanced two drug candidates along its pipeline. The first, INM-750, is for the treatment of a rare genetic connective tissue disorder, called epidermolysis bullosa (EB), that affects roughly one out of every 20,000 births in the United States. The condition, which currently has no approved treatment or cure, has been called “The Worst Disease You’ve Never Heard Of” by the Dystrophic Epidermolysis Bullosa Research Association of America. INM-750 works by replacing missing keratins in the skin with specially selected cannabinoids in an effort to modulate the painful manifestations of EB.

Also in pre-clinical trials is INM-085 for the treatment of glaucoma, a leading cause of blindness, according to the Glaucoma Research Foundation. The drug reduces the elevated intra-ocular pressure that is often associated with glaucoma. It is targeting a large market. The National Institutes of Health estimates that more than 3 million Americans currently have glaucoma, and that the disease has blinded more than 120,000.

InMed continues to expand its cannabinoid R&D. This has already produced huge success for GW Pharmaceuticals (market cap: $3 billion) after its Sativex, derived from cannabis, was approved for the treatment of multiple sclerosis (MS).

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.InMedPharma.com

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Player’s Network, Inc. (OTCQB: PNTV) is a fully reporting diversified holdings company, operating in two main industries: medical marijuana and media. The company’s primary objective is to create shareholder value by identifying opportunities in niche emerging markets. PNTV has three prominent subsidiaries: Next Gen TV, WeedTV.com, and Green Leaf Farms, all of which operate under profitable business models.

The primary goal for WeedTV.com is to generate revenues from its proprietary channels and clients. Proprietary channels that Player’s Network is able to generate revenues through include membership subscriptions, advertising, and cross-selling with other organizations. In addition to this, the company’s Next Gen TV gives businesses, brands, and celebrities the tools to create their own network, allowing them to build channels that can be viewed from anywhere.

Player’s Network also owns 86% of Green Leaf Farms Holdings, LLC, better known as Green Leaf. To generate revenue, the company has identified the “best breed” operators to ensure the highest quality of medical marijuana and edibles. These are then legally sold to dispensaries across the state of Nevada. The company is projecting significant revenues, especially for Green Leaf Farms due to recreational marijuana being passed in Nevada.

WeedTV.com, a social media network and informational tool for the marijuana industry, and Green Leaf operate under a unique business model compared to their competitors. Because both are partially or fully owned by Player’s Network, the company combined its knowledge of production, distribution, and marketing, creating a strategy whereby WeedTV.com is able to push Green Leaf products while promoting other companies, leading to two sources of revenue.

Green Leaf is a private company with a Medical Marijuana Establishment license that has 3.4 acres of cultivation and production facilities. In order to maintain high levels of production with its current level of promotion and distribution, Player’s Network aims to continue developing and launching platforms such as WeedTV.com in order to continue expanding its products and services to customers.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.PlayersNetwork.com

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Marina Biotech Inc. (OTCQB: MRNA) filed a 10K with the SEC on April 5, 2017, for its year ended December 31, 2016. The late stage biopharmaceutical company summarized its achievements in 2016 and provided an outlook into its 2017 performance, including its planned clinical trials in 2018. Marina Biotech specializes in creating and commercializing innovative therapies for treatments of cancer, hypertension, and arthritis.

The firm plans to move by the first quarter of 2018 into a phase 3 clinical study of its drug candidate, IT-102, a fixed dose combination (FDC) bi-layer tablet, said Joseph Ramelli, chief executive officer of Marina Biotech. It recently signed an agreement for Windlas Healthcare Limited to manufacture the tablet, positioning Marina Biotech for the Phase 3 study. That India-based firm has facilities that are approved by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) in the U.S., as well as the European Union Good Manufacturing Practices (EU cGMP).

The company also reported:

• Marina Biotech expanded its unsecured credit line from its chairman, Dr. Vuong Trieu, on April 4, 2017, for an additional $500,000. The initial line was for $540,000 secured last November. The company had drawn down $250,000 of that by December 31, 2016. The company also secured another line of credit from Autotelic, Inc., for the commercialization of IT-102 and IT-103.
• The company announced that it has completed its merger with IThena Pharma, enabling it to advance its development of combination tablets for arthritis, pain, cancer and hypertension. The transaction with IThena Pharma has put in motion a new pipeline by Marina Biotech that advances its development of combination therapies.
• Marina Biotech announced the results of new preclinical and clinical data for its drug candidates IT-102 and IT-103. These results support the further development of both for the treatment of hypertension/pain, Ramelli said. Among these results was the indication that IT-102 and IT-103 could serve as unique anticancer agents.
• In February of 2017 the company entered into a licensing agreement with LipoMedics, under which Marina Biotech could receive up to $90 million in milestone payments which are success based. Under that agreement, Marina Biotech gave a license to LipoMedics for its SMARTICLES platform for the delivery of nanoparticles, including small molecules.

For more information, visit www.MarinaBio.com

How does a company in the mining industry successfully move toward becoming a leader in the marijuana sector, specifically cannabinoid-based pharmaceutical therapies that treat a variety of diseases and conditions? In the case of India Globalization Capital, Inc. (NYSE MKT: IGC), the answer is creative management’s ability to identify opportunity, coupled with a relentless drive toward innovation.

IGC made its switch to the marijuana industry after its CEO, Executive Chairman, and President Ram Mukunda was unafraid to recognize and act on a need for the company to make a positive and swift switch to a stronger and more lucrative market. This led IGC to cannabis and, in particular, phytocannabinoids.

The cannabis plant has a number of subspecies, some of which have psychoactive properties and others do not. Cannabis sativa is psychoactive, while other forms, such as Cannabis Sativa L., or hemp, and Cannabis ruderalis, are not. In fact, the latter offer high levels of cannabidiol, which is most commonly used on a medical level.

Legal marijuana is now becoming one of the fastest growing industries in the United States, expected to create just under 300,000 jobs for Americans by 2020 (http://dtn.fm/fEq5E), and an increasing number of states are legalizing the drug both medically and recreationally, with the potential for further legalization on the horizon.

Although the marijuana industry is growing at an exponential rate, federal laws that classify marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug make it hard for businesses to reach their full potential,but IGC has been able to research and take advantage of cannabinoids, since these are not illegal. Part of IGC’s success is due to the fact that the company is not going about its mission to help patients suffering from pain, PTSD, seizures, and many other diseases on its own. The company is creating strategic alliances with doctors, researchers, dispensaries, and practitioners, among other industry experts, in order to develop a product portfolio of much needed phytocannabinoid-based therapies.

IGC has entered into the industry aware that there is a huge amount of information already available at the grassroots level of the marijuana industry. This is why it is seeking IP transfers with producers who know about growing hybrids and strains that are rich in specific phytocannabinoids that can be used in a pharmaceutical environment to help patients who could benefit from cannabinoids.

In addition to its extensive development pipeline, which includes six products for various disorders in both adults and animals and three expected to go through to preclinical trials this year, IGC is planning on taking equity positions within companies that are directly and indirectly part of the marijuana industry, another way that investors can take advantage of a booming industry.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.IGCinc.us

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The scourge of HIV/AIDS surged to the forefront of American consciousness in 1980 when the first case was reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Initially thought to be transmitted solely through homosexual liaisons, it was soon realized that the disease could be passed through the bodily fluids of any person infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Contrary to early myths, HIV cannot be contracted by shaking hands or hugging, or by touching dishes or toilet seats used by infected people. It doesn’t spread through the air, through insect bites or through sweat, saliva or urine. HIV is only spread through sexual intercourse, sharing needles, or by a mother passing the disease to her child at birth, and it is transmitted through blood, semen, pre-seminal fluid, rectal fluids, vaginal fluids or breast milk.

Urban legend purports that HIV started in the 1980s, but that was only when the public first became aware of HIV and when it was officially recognized as a new health concern. The origin of HIV has been a topic of debate since the virus was first identified. Scientific research now estimates with some certainty that in the early 1900s a simian form of HIV was transmitted to humans in Africa as a result of chimps being killed and eaten, or by chimp blood getting into cuts on people in the course of hunting. The virus morphed within its new human host and became HIV-1, which went on to become the pandemic strain of HIV that has killed over 35 million people worldwide.

The virus attacks the immune system and destroys specific white blood cells (CD4 cells). The virus also makes copies of itself inside these cells, and, as it destroys more CD4 cells and makes more copies of itself, it completely cripples a person’s immune system. In late stage HIV infection, acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), there is severe loss of the body’s cellular immunity and a dramatic decrease in resistance to infection and malignancy. Impossible to fight off disease, HIV led to certain death.

Researchers scrambled to understand the disease and find effective treatments. In 1986, the first antiviral drug to inhibit HIV replication was approved by the FDA. Other drugs followed to limit production of the virus in CD4 cells. However, these mono-therapy drug treatments were only partially proficient and curiously exhibited differing degrees of efficacy among different patients. Researchers soon realized that HIV could quickly develop resistance to any single medication and, soon after, they developed combination drug therapies that suffocated mutated forms of HIV before they could rampantly replicate.

This combination of HIV medicines, antiretroviral therapy (ART), prevents HIV from multiplying and reduces the amount of HIV in the body. Less HIV in the body protects the immune system and helps prevent HIV infection from advancing to AIDS. Today, highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) is the primary regimen for treating immune deterioration in HIV patients. Weakened but still incurable, the HIV virus remains in the body and requires diligent daily treatment, and, over time, efficacy even diminishes in some patients. While HAART has transformed HIV from a deadly disease to a chronic one, it has several major difficulties, namely, resistance, compliance, side effects, and short- and long-term toxicity. These four problems are the primary reasons why there are currently only about 35% of the HIV patients in the U.S. with a suppressed viral load (which is typically defined as a HIV level of less than 40 copies per milliliter of blood). It is important to note that if a HIV patient has a suppressed viral load the rate of transmission is almost zero.

CytoDyn Inc. (OTCQB: CYDY) is pioneering the development of new weapons in the continued war against HIV. Focused on improving the quality of life for HIV patients, the company is developing new therapies to address the growing number of treatment challenged HIV patients with its clinical development of humanized monoclonal antibodies for the treatment of HIV infection. CytoDyn is at the forefront of developing this category of drugs and has progressed to the late stages of clinical development.

The company’s leading monoclonal antibody drug candidate, PRO 140, is a therapeutic anti-viral agent that is currently being evaluated in two concurrent Phase III clinical trials for the treatment of patients already infected with HIV. With less frequent dosing and minimal side effects and toxicity, PRO 140 is a new class of HIV therapeutic that protects healthy cells from viral infection. Recognizing the potential, CytoDyn recently filed a request with the FDA to assign PRO 140 a Breakthrough Therapy Designation, which would differentiate PRO 140 from all other currently used HIV treatments.

The war against HIV is far from over, but with the development of new drugs like CytoDyn’s PRO 140, each individual battle takes us a step closer to complete victory.

For more information, visit www.CytoDyn.com

A pre-clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, InMed Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (OTCQB: IMLFF) has revealed two additions to its drug development pipeline. An expedited drug development timeline is now in place for INM-750 for epidermolysis bullosa (EB), with a potential market of about $1 billion. The disease is characterized by fragile skin in children. The company has also announced the development of INM-085 for glaucoma, which represents a potential global market of over $5 billion.

Resulting in a defect in the connective tissue between the dermis and epidermis, most often caused by a lack of keratins, EB currently has no medication-based treatments. Multiple cannabinoids are the active ingredients of INM-750, which is now under development as a topical drug. These were selected to manage keratin levels in people with EB, in which fragile skin can blister and tear easily with the slightest friction or trauma. The cannabinoids were also chosen to address inflammation, itching, wound healing, pain, and skin regeneration.

One of the leading causes of blindness, glaucoma is associated with high fluid pressure in the eye, which can damage the optic nerve. The first glaucoma treatment of its kind, INM-085 will be a multi-target, multi-mechanism therapy. It will contain multiple cannabinoids that can reduce elevated intra-ocular pressure and protect retinal ganglion cells and optic nerve tissues. The drug will be designed to be applied directly to the eye as a topical formulation.

The new drugs in development are in addition to the company’s other initiatives, including a number of cannabinoid-based drugs. Dr. Ado Muhammed, MD, DPM, MFPM, chief medical officer of IMLFF, is a leader in developing cannabinoid therapies. Prior to joining InMed, he served as executive on board at GW Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: GWPH), where he was involved in the development and regulatory approval of one of the first prescription cannabis-based drugs on the market. Muhammed has had strategic roles in the research and development, clinical development, and commercialization of specialty drugs.

InMed’s core assets also include a computer-based drug/disease target screening tool and a proprietary cannabinoid manufacturing system. The bioinformatics tool has helped InMed identify novel cannabinoids thanks to algorithms that have allowed the integration of data from various bioinformatics databases. It also uses a database of approved pharmaceutical products and one consisting of over 90 cannabinoid drugs. The company has used the tool to associate approved pharmaceuticals with cannabinoids that have similar structures in order to identify which ones will act on specific genes and proteins.

A biosynthesis system is in development, which is based on similar processes that use bacteria and yeast in industrial applications. It will allow InMed to manufacture naturally occurring cannabinoids in the laboratory at high yields. An alternative to chemical manufacturing methods, it could address production, quality control, purification, and structural integrity. The system is expected to be a revolution in the rapidly emerging cannabinoid pharmaceutical sector.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.InMedPharma.com

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