As the prospect of marijuana rescheduling dims under this new administration, Bright Green Corp., one of a select group of organizations authorized by the DEA to grow cannabis for research, is withdrawing its renewal applications as part of a restructuring plan.
Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Bright Green filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Feb. 22. The company announced Jan. 27 that it had signed an agreement with majority shareholders to restructure the company to focus on producing legal controlled substances and continue a partnership with an Asia-based investment group to recruit owner/investors to build new DEA- and FDA-compliant “mega farms” via an EB-5 Investment Visa program.
The agreement followed the resignation of CEO Gurvinder “Groovy” Singh and Chief Financial Officer Saleem Elmasri, as well as three other board members. The remaining board member and co-founder, Lynn Stockwell, is now chief executive.
As part of the restructuring plan, Bright Green entered into an agreement with the DEA to immediately withdraw all cannabis-related renewal applications.
“This agreement will allow for reinstatement once the company has satisfied that there is commercial value, and the federal government clarifies a path that will stabilize operations for medical research and possible drug development,” said a Feb. 24 company press release.
“The company will not canvas equity and then jeopardize shareholder value by the uncertainty of the United States cannabis industry,” Stockwell said in the statement.
Bright Green never grew cannabis
Bright Green was incorporated in 2019 and started trading on Nasdaq in 2022. It received approval from the DEA in 2023 to grow marijuana for research at a facility in Grants, N.M. It also obtained a cannabis research laboratory license from the state.
But Bright Green never produced any cannabis, and the facility has been “mothballed,” said John Stockwell, husband of Lynn Stockwell, in a joint interview with CRB Monitor News.
One reason why is they needed a customer that was a Schedule I research participant, he said. Obtaining banking services for a federally illegal drug was another challenge.
“If there isn’t banking available to do business, then it isn’t a business,” John Stockwell said.
In 2023, the company announced a couple of private placement offerings, first at $39.99 a share and then at $2.00 per share, pursuant to the U.S. government’s EB-5 immigrant investor program. A few months later, it launched a new EB-5 program with Asia Capital Pioneers Group Inc. It offered foreign investors 100,000 shares at $8.80 per share, according to a November 2023 press release. The investors could then apply for U.S. citizenship.
“Both Lynn and myself paid $800,000 for the opportunity to be a green card holder,” John Stockwell said. They are originally from Canada.
Soon after the DEA proposed to reschedule marijuana to a Schedule III controlled substance in May 2024, Bright Green announced it was expanding into producing Schedule I and Schedule II controlled substances, including cannabis, even though its state license expired that March, according to the New Mexico Regulation and Licensing Department.
“We aim to handle 70% of all Marijuana, Marijuana extract, and Tetrahydrocannabinols production within the DEA’s program,” Singh said in a May 30, 2024, press release.
“I’m ecstatic to announce we are in the final stages of preparation to begin production at the existing facility,” he said then. “With the current EB-5 push, we aim to deliver initial production by end of the first quarter of 2025.”
Instead, the company was delisted from Nasdaq in September 2024, announced their restructuring in January, and filed for bankruptcy in February. It currently trades on the OTC Markets as BGXX. As of March 18, its stock price was about 4 cents.
“Made In America” drugs
Now the Stockwells plan to capitalize on President Donald Trump’s “America first” policies to produce other controlled substances in the U.S. Upon approval by the bankruptcy court, the company will be renamed to Drugs Made in America Corp.
John Stockwell said the company will focus on producing drugs in schedules II through IV. He said there are 19 different plants in the Controlled Substances Act. “Poppies, for sure,” will be one plant they’ll grow, he said.
He said the DEA and the White House have been very supportive. He declined to comment when asked if he knew Trump personally.
“This new federal administration is actively positioning Bright Green to participate in the production, drug manufacturing and prescription drug delivery back to the United States,” Lynn Stockwell said in the Feb. 24 press release.
Singh is coming back to the company to manage the EB-5 program. The company hopes to raise $3.5 billion through $800,000 individual investments from applicants seeking a green card under the program who would then own and operate DEA and FDA-compliant farms.
According to the bankruptcy filing, Bright Green has $5.65 million in assets and $8.14 million in liabilities. Its largest creditor is law firm Dentons U.S., with a nearly $2.4 million unsecured claim.
Under the restructuring plan, Lynn Stockwell will fund a $6.5 million exit facility to pay all allowed administrative claims and professional fees. She will be able to convert up to $4 million of her secured claim and share value into 10 million shares of Series A Convertible Voting Preferred Stock. The remaining claim would be rolled into the exit facility.
Unsecured creditors would be paid 20% in cash and 80% in newly issued common stock in Lynn Stockwell’s other company, Drugs Made in America Acquisition Corp. (Nasdaq: DMAA). New common stock would be issued to existing shareholders after a 50-to-one reverse split. Outstanding warrants and other contracts would be retired, canceled, extinguished or discharged.
Seven remaining DEA cultivators
Bright Green’s exit from research cultivation leaves seven DEA-registered companies, according to the CRB Monitor database:
- Royal Emerald Pharmaceuticals Research and Development in California
- Irvine Labs Inc. in California
- Scottsdale Research Institute in Arizona
- Maridose LLC in Florida and Maine
- Groff NA Hemplex in Pennsylvania
- Biopharmaceutical Research Co. in California
- University of Mississippi’s National Center for Development of Natural Products in Mississippi
Jason Adelstone, an attorney at Harris-Sliwoski who specializes in international cannabis policy, suggested in a March 5 blog post that these companies should advocate for at least Schedule II status while the currently delayed process to move marijuana to Schedule III plays out.
Adelstone says Attorney General Pamela Bondi could unilaterally move marijuana to Schedule II immediately under federal rules to align with international treaty obligations. And the DEA could redefine “medical cannabis” so that flower can be exported internationally for sale.
As other countries, such as Germany, legalize, “It would open up enormous opportunities because everyone wants American marijuana,” he told CRB Monitor News.
It wouldn’t be a big win for the U.S. cannabis industry, but it would be a slight win, at least for the Trump Administration. “They can say, ‘We’ve done more than the Biden Administration,’ which Trump loves to do,” Adelstone said.
(This article was updated March 20, 2025, to correct the number of DEA-registered companies.)
