Celadon Pharmaceuticals Becomes First UK Company to Obtain License for Sale of Medical Marijuana

Celadon Pharmaceuticals is the first UK company to get a license from the Home Office to sell medical cannabis products in the UK.

The London-listed company can now make deals to sell its cannabis oil to private clinics that are allowed to give medical marijuana prescriptions (MMJ). The Financial Times said that they can also give MMJ to universities and drug companies that are doing research and development.

Celadon was only allowed to grow cannabis and make tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) oil under its Home Office license. But on Tuesday, the British Home Office changed Celadon’s license, so the company can now start selling MMJ. The move came after the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) gave the 100,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Birmingham a Good Manufacturing Practices registration in January 2023.

“It’s a big deal,” said James Short, CEO of Celadon. “But after four years and putting in tens of millions of pounds,. . . we’ve done it.”

Celadon was started in 2018, and the company is hoping to make a lot of money by the end of the year.

Celadon’s shares, which are traded on London’s junior Aim market, went up by at least 25% after the news came out on Tuesday afternoon.

Short said that Celadon’s manufacturing plant, which employs 34 people, can currently grow about 3 tons of cannabis flower a year. Once production is stepped up, however, the facility will be able to handle closer to 10 tons a year, which could bring in up to $110 million in revenue.

READ MORE: The Kentucky Senate Officially Approved a Legislation To Legalize Medical Marijuana!

So far, the only way to legally sell cannabis products in the UK was to get approval from the MHRA after going through clinical trials.

Jazz Pharmaceuticals bought a British company called GW Pharmaceuticals.
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For $7.2 billion in May 2021, it will be the first company to sell a medicine made from cannabis to the NHS.

But now, Short said, “The UK is now open for business,” and he called medical cannabis oil “liquid gold.”

The Department of Health and Social Care thinks that up to 3 million people with chronic pain could be able to use MMJ.

Short said that if a UK-based supplier is approved, there won’t be any more supply problems because cannabis oil won’t have to be brought in from other countries.

“You can only import on a named patient, so you can only import enough product for that patient’s prescription,” Short said. “Now, we can get a prescription today and supply that patient within 24 hours.”