AFRICA ( Commonwealth Union) _ South African medical cannabis startup Cilo Cybin Holdings Ltd plans to try again five months after postponing a planned initial public offering. This time, ALPS Global Holding Bhd of Malaysia would support them in their endeavour. With the intention of listing Cilo Cybin in Johannesburg by the middle of the year, ALPS Global would invest a total of 54 million rand (RM13.3 million) in a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, called Cilo Cybin.
The founder of Cilo Cybin, Gabriel Theron, stated in an interview that the financing of the SPAC would enable the company to list by way of introduction on the Johannesburg Alternative Exchange. Then, using the ALPS network in Malaysia and Singapore, we intend to raise a second round of dollars.
The first South African business to be granted authorization to cultivate, refine, and package cannabis products is Cilo Cybin, which will produce a variety of wellness, biotechnology, and healthcare-related goods for ALPS.
After the capital raising process took longer than expected, its original effort to list failed, and negotiations with ALPS, which estimates its value at roughly US$1.3 billion, started.The pharmaceutical division of Cilo Cybin, which grows cannabis strains with high concentrations of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC—the primary psychoactive compound in marijuana plants—will be acquired through the SPAC. One of them is the potent cannabis strain known locally as Durban Poison.
According to ALPS’s chief executive officer and founder, Tham Seng Kong, we are interested in Cilo Cybin because it has the promise of future therapeutic development for conditions like Parkinson’s. He further stated that Cannabis is just the start.
Cilo Cybin is named after the hallucinogenic component of magic mushrooms, which it intends to study and commercialize as a product. In accordance with the SPAC agreement, ALPS will own around 85% of the cannabis company, including its current 10% investment. 10% of the listed firm will be owned by the general public, with the remaining 90% by Theron. However, near the end of the year, ALPS intends to list on the Nasdaq in New York.
