First Off

Rowan: It’s Monday, folks, and guess who seems to be coming down with a cold? That’s right—me. Don’t worry too much, though. I got my flu shot, and I already carry tissues and hand sanitizer everywhere.

AND I’m still gearing up (along with the rest of our team) for our State of Innovation event on autonomous vehicles this Thursday. Haven’t bought your ticket yet? The clock is ticking, y’all. Get on it.

The Big One

A breakdown on the day’s biggest Inno story.

Emily: Since the first marijuana sales in the Bay State began in 2018, a number of cannabis-related startups have grown their way into the Boston innovation ecosystem. Among these are Ascend Wellness, a marijuana cultivation and processing company, and Trella Technologies, which developed an indoor plant-growing system.

One company, however, is going where few cannabis companies dare to tread: The realm of dairy products. Cloud Creamery is a Framingham-based food startup that is creating cannabis-infused ice cream from locally sourced ingredients. It plans to distribute its flavors to local dispensaries, hospitals and medical facilities, with the goal of creating an alternate source of wellness for people seeking pain relief from auto-immune diseases and conditions.

David Yusefzadeh, the CEO and founder of Cloud Creamery, was inspired to start the company by his own personal struggles with pain treatments. When he was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease in 2011, Yusefzadeh began various treatments and medications, all of which had various negative side effects on his body and health. Seeking a side-effect-free way to treat his condition, Yusefzadeh decided to try cannabis. But being a former chef and healthy eater in general, he was disappointed with the selection of edibles normally available in dispensaries.

“Everything I was finding was just really poor quality food, there was nothing exciting, nothing thoughtful, nothing I could tell where the ingredients were sourced, it was just very synthetic, artificial coloring, artificial flavoring,” said Yusefzadeh, “It really sunk in that this was my opportunity to create something to help myself, so I tried a few edibles just to try to understand what the effects would be, what it would do for my body, and eventually I just started making my own at home.”

In The Know

The Inno stories you need to read today.

This Startup Thinks Putting Health Care on the Blockchain Could Improve Access — BostInno
VIDEO: Up Close and Personal with Locus Robotics’ Warehouse Robots — BostInno
Somerville Manufacturing Platform Startup Tulip Snags $39.5M — BostInno
YouTube is experimenting with ways to make its algorithm even more addictive — Technology Review

Elsewhere in Inno

Stories from around the Inno network we think you’ll dig.

Kanarys Platform Creates Diversity Through Collaboration — NTX Inno
Introducing the SEG’s Newest Health & Wellness Accelerator Cohort — Rhode Island Inno
Block.one Branches Out From Blacksburg With $10M Northern Virginia Headquarters — Richmond Inno

Making Moves

Inside the people, companies and organizations making moves in Boston.

Rowan: Here’s a scoop for all you Beatheads: Corporate travel startup Lola.com has been expanding so rapidly that it just leased a new, 28K-sq.-ft. office space on the 20th floor of One Financial Center in Boston. The ribbon-cutting ceremony is scheduled for November, according to an email from a spokesperson.

Rowan: Some of tomorrow’s top innovators are doing business out of a building that was completed in 1865. Boston’s Old City Hall, nestled in a corner of Downtown Boston at 45 School St., has been operating as an office building since 1971. Underscore VC moved in just over a year ago and, over the summer, completed phase two of a three-stage renovation. The space is designed to welcome investors, incubating entrepreneurs and the firm’s UFirst Accelerator participants to collaborate.

Rowan: Months after raising $135M from investors, another gene editing startup co-founded by MIT researcher Feng Zhang is preparing to go public, our sister publication the Boston Business Journal reports. Cambridge’s Beam Therapeutics filed documents with the SEC after markets closed Friday disclosing its plan to launch on Nasdaq and raise at least $100M. The company plans to use the stock ticker “BEAM.”

Sri: Market research firm Hired put together a list of the top companies Boston tech workers want to work for. Check it out.

New Money

Your daily funding roundup.

Rowan: Cambridge-based Platelet BioGenesis, which is developing genetically engineered platelet-based therapeutics, signed a $56M contract with the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority. Platelet BioGenesis will use the funding to develop and establish donor-independent platelets as a medical countermeasure for treating victims of a nuclear or radiological event.

Player Personnel

Who’s moving where.

Rowan: Boston-based ReviveHealth has made several new hires, according to a press release emailed to BostInno:

Lindsey Thompson as EVP of communications
Ryan Colaianni as SVP of issues and crisis
Bjorn Gunnerud as SVP of insights
Gale Pryor as VP of content

Sri: Jennifer Lum joined Harvard University as an entrepreneur-in-residence, per her LinkedIn profile. She previously co-founded and served as chief product officer for Forge.ai.

In The Community

The events and happenings to know about tonight and this week.

Emily: Brand Strategy Workshop: This workshop, hosted by General Assembly, focuses on a question we’ve all probably asked at least once in our lives: What’s a brand? Throughout the night, you’ll learn some of the brand strategies used by marketers in large companies, and you’ll get a head start on building your own brand. Get tickets here.
6:30 p.m., 125 Summer St., Boston, $40

Listen to This Right Now

Insight and analysis from the community and beyond.

Zach: Mike Volpe is the CEO of Lola.com, the fast-growing corporate travel SaaS platform that raised $37M earlier this year with aims to dominate the $1.6T global travel market. HubSpot’s third founder and former marketing chief, Volpe was offered the position of Lola.com CEO while still the CMO at Cybereason, a cybersecurity SaaS company, where he led marketing and sales development. Listen to his interview with Boston Speaks Up here.