Evora Technologies Inc. is a cannabis management platform based in Alberta, that provides growers with Production Management, Quality Management “eQMS”, as well as Cannabis Cultivation and Processing “Seed-to-Sale” software solutions.
By providing a service that combines all these systems, Evora seeks to not only track the kind of information Health Canada requires through the CTLS system, but to help cultivators and processors better understand their own operational strengths and weaknesses.
We’ve been along each step from the 28 day audits of Health Canada in the early days, to where we are today with recreational and medical cannabis and mostly online inspections.
The team behind Evora has more than 15 years of combined experience working in the legal Canadian cannabis industry, taking their own experiences working with licensed producers and Health Canada’s evolving regulatory system and building what they see as the next evolution of systems management platforms.
Co-founder Matt Howardson says his past experience working with Delta9 Bio-Tech in Manitoba and Sundial Growers in Alberta has helped shape his understanding of what does and doesn’t work in the industry.
“We’ve been doing cannabis since the MMPR,” says Howardson. “We were license number six with Delta 9, so we really got to be a part of what the cannabis framework has become. We’ve been along each step from the 28 day audits of Health Canada in the early days, to where we are today with recreational and medical cannabis and mostly online inspections.
“It’s allowed us to grow with Health Canada’s regulations and gives us some insight into what the regulator is going to look for when they audit. And that’s key.”
Our goal at the start was to make a paperless cannabis facility and that led to us making an eQMS engine and a seed-to-sale engine that are all combined so that really you can go without any paper through all your compliance regulations and Health Canada audits as well as all your seed-to-sale.
Whereas many seed-to-sale platforms offer the ability to track things like planting or harvest dates, or maintaining batch inventory, Howardson says the goal at Evora is to harmonize all aspects of a facility to not only track data but to understand and analyze systems to capitalize on efficiencies and address inefficiencies.
By building a brand new system tailored specifically for the Cannabis industry, and with the experience of how Canada’s regulatory system works, they hope to be the new standard bearer in terms of helping cannabis businesses improve their operations.
“If you’re a grower or a processor or both, what you’re really wanting to look for is not just solutions that have been established and are in place, but solutions that are built for cannabis,” continues Howardson. “That’s where we see our opportunity. We’re not backed onto a platform like SAP Business One or Microsoft Dynamics where you’re chained to their design principles and their practices. We’ve got the freedom to move to how we see the market transitioning. So that gives us a lot more creative moments where we can do partnerships like ours with Growfit and can bring in other points of data not just for compliance but for operational efficiency.”
“Our goal at the start of this,” says Rick Hugie, co-founder and CTO, “was to make a paperless cannabis facility and that led to us making an eQMS engine and a seed-to-sale engine that are all combined so that really you can go without any paper through all your compliance regulations and Health Canada audits as well as all your seed-to-sale. So we’ve built the system around making sure we can not only capture all the data required by the CTLS, but integrate it into all other aspects of the operation.”
That includes not only the growing or processing side, but also the sales side.
“One of the things that’s really missing in the industry,” explains Hugie, “is that there’s a sales side and a growing side and these are often not tied together. So you have people on the sales side that have deals with say the AGLC, but they have no idea that something has gone wrong in the growing facility which means that harvest is maybe going to be late until close to the end, and they find out they are short for an order they already sold.
“Our software ties all that together so you can connect your sales and connect that back to the batch you are growing and see the progress along the way.”
Because of their past experience in the industry, Evora can then not only provide a platform to gather that data for everything from planting and harvest dates, but sales information and basic facilities management.
“We come from an insider perspective and have seen failures and successes and that has allowed us to understand what the numbers look like and where you need to be,” says Howardson. “Cannabis is both an art and a science and anybody who has grown will understand that. So from the grower side, we can walk through your processes, get an understanding of what your inputs are and the timing of it, what you’re putting in and when.
“Then from the business and regulatory side, we’ve got a full set of SOP templates where we can come in and get that going for you, analyze your business processes, walk through your workflow, get all of those key pieces set up and then once its into our system you can leverage that for forecasting and insight. Now you can look at what are realistic timelines based on how we’ve analyzed your business.”
Recently launched, the team says they are excited about working with new producers who are looking for a data tracking system that can provide more than simple spreadsheets.
“We’re really trying to give them the information to run their business better,” says Hugie. “Not just to be compliant, but to actually run your business intelligently. Because in my experience in the industry, most decisions right now are being made on speculation because they don’t actually have the data. Having all the information together can help you better understand what worked or didn’t work and why, all in context.”
