Only very few specialized cannabis VCs are already invested in European cannabis businesses. One of them: Artemis Growth Partners. Prior to ICBC 2025 in Berlin Will Muecke, co-founder and managing member, provides an optimistic outlook for Europe’s cannabis markets, especially for Germany, based on increasing patient numbers and the coalition agreement which provides political certainty. Will speaks about why investors should now focus on European cannabis businesses, what kind of investors might be willing to provide capital, how the chaos on public markets affects the private cannabis markets and why he thinks that founders should not only focus on high valuations when fundraising.
krautinvest.de: Many industry stakeholders in Germany were looking forward to 2025 last year. Most of them had anticipated increasing investments and M&A activities. Given these high expectations the first quarter of 2025 looks somehow disappointing. Is the only expectation the increased uncertainty based on the federal election in February?
Will Muecke: I think that was probably the biggest impediment to a better flow of capital—though not the only one. Another factor is that investors were waiting to see real data coming out of the CanG era. Even for us, this is challenging, as Germany doesn’t actually track the number of patients. If we were estimating the market to be around 250,000 patients before April 1, 2024, where are we now? Based on feedback from many companies in our network, we have a good snapshot now and we estimate the current active patient roll is between 700,000 and 900,000 patients. So I think we’re definitely moving forward. And yes, investors have been waiting for political certainty that the CanG wouldn’t be rolled back. The coalition agreement is, therefore, great news for the German industry. The other issue is data—we’ve all seen the import numbers.
Disclaimer: This interview is part of a media partnership with ICBC. Our readers get 30% discount with the code MJCOMMS30 via this link. Will Muecke will be part of the panel „Global Cannabis Industry Horizons: Key investment insights in the rapidly evolving cannabis industry“ on Tuesday 29th of April 2025 at 11:45am.
krautinvest.de: But imports don’t equal patients…
Will Muecke: True, it’s kind of a strange metric, because likely only a little more than half of that total import volume gets sold to pharmacies. But still, import volumes went from around 30 tons in 2023 to more than 70 tons in 2024. For retail sales, that equates to two to three times higher retail sales last year than the year before—and most of that growth happened in the second half of 2024. And we expect that 2025 is going to be even bigger than 2024. From an investor’s perspective, you could say we’re on solid political footing, since the rules in Germany aren’t likely to change significantly. The next question is: Are my patient roll numbers lining up with expectations? And I think we’re doing well there. We might already be at a million patients, or more. If not now, then we will be there very soon.
krautinvest.de: So you’re optimistic that we will see more investments in the upcoming months?
Will Muecke: I know German cannabis companies are planning to raise capital at significantly higher valuations compared to their last pre-CanG rounds. My guess is the next wave of capital raising will likely come in the second half of the year, once companies can link their valuations to projected 2026 performance. The growth is absolutely there—proven by import volumes, patient numbers, and market penetration. It’s kind of wild that Germany is still only at less than 1% penetration for cannabis patients. There’s a lot of room to grow. So while capital always lags behind the news, 2025 is shaping up to be another big year. And 2026 growth projections will likely be even stronger than what we’re seeing in 2025, as cannabis goes more mainstream and the legal patient roll likely more than doubles over 2024 numbers.
krautinvest.de: So the future looks great despite the tariffs of the Trump administration and the global volatility?
Will Muecke: I’d say we are getting to a place where we will have a more normalized view of cannabis as an accepted investment category. Obviously, the global economy has its issues currently, but cannabis as an industry is relatively unaffected by those macro events. Cannabis has shown itself to be a resilient category and perhaps even somewhat counter cyclical to global shocks. COVID was a prime example of that. So for investors, the backdrop of macro world events is just that. A backdrop. Cannabis should be evaluated on its growth fundamentals and performance of management teams should be judged by how well they can manage high growth in a capital constrained market. As for tariffs— tariffs might become an issue for imported Chinese products, including vape hardware and the like, and perhaps for companies importing Chinese CBD. But for medical or adult use cannabis, there are no legal imports into the US so tariffs have no direct effect on US operators. Still, I do think tariffs create anxiety for investors. They start asking themselves: Should I invest privately in a high-risk, high-return category like cannabis, or just buy Google at a 30% discount and enjoy the liquidity? So yeah, it impacts investor psychology—but not the cannabis industry itself.
„The chaos in the public markets won’t stop fundraising—but it will impact valuation.“
krautinvest.de: Even long before Trump’s announcements of tariffs, if you look at the publicly listed big Canadian and US players, valuation has gone down. Does that affect their ability to raise capital for investments in Germany?
Will Muecke: Private valuation is not like public market valuation, but the two do echo each other. When it comes to private cannabis investments, we’re talking about institutional investors taking long-term stakes in growing businesses and not going in and out of positions. Public markets are more “mom and pop” retail, driven by sentiment more than fundamentals. Private investors who do their homework can actually benefit from the drop in public valuations—because we can negotiate better deals. If I can buy into a liquid public company at 1.5x sales, why would I pay 5x sales for your illiquid private company? So that gives us a solid foundation for valuation discussions. While this might seem like a tough market for operators to raise capital, the truth is companies still need funding to grow. I’d tell them: Maybe raise a smaller round right now to limit dilution, but don’t wait too long. And don’t obsess over dilution—because in a fast-growing market, not having capital is worse. Raise the round, do what you can to mitigate dilution smartly, grow through the rough capital market, and then raise a larger round when conditions are more favorable to issuers. The chaos in the public markets won’t stop fundraising—but it will impact valuation. Smart companies will minimize that dilution risk, raise the capital anyway, and focus on growth and profitability.
krautinvest.de: Talking about valuation. Are the valuations of German businesses already too high for investors? After the very hard years of 2022 and 2023 many businesses were forced to focus on profitability. A few of them are not depending that much on the next funding round…
Will Muecke: For private companies, my advice is: Don’t try and top tick valuation on each round. You want your investors to be rewarded in the next round for backing you now. That means leaving some meat on the bone—some upside in the deal. Maybe raise less money if you’re concerned about dilution, but if you’re just chasing higher and higher valuations from round to round, it’s not going to end well. Sure, maybe you raise this round at a super high valuation if you’re lucky—but good luck raising the next round without it being a down round. As an investment manager, I want my portfolio to be valued well, but I’d much rather see a steady, logical curve of rising valuations than a rollercoaster of successive ups and downs. I think companies without strong advisors or real experience will aim too high on their valuation and will get burned in the end. Either rounds won’t close, or they won’t attract the right investors. Happy sophisticated investors will always work hard to support founders and management through good times and bad. Unhappy unsophisticated investors destroy companies. You want to attract sophisticated investors and you want to keep them happy. It’s pretty simple.
„The more exciting players are the ones working on unique formulations“
krautinvest.de: Earlier, we talked about market performance and noticed that after the coalition agreement certainty exists to some level and that the data shows impressive growth in terms of patient numbers. The question remains which business models you would like to invest in?
Will Muecke: Any cannabis product that goes through a wholesaler and ends up in a pharmacy is basically a branded generic. We can invest in those businesses all day—they make money and you can build out the supply chain. But it’s kind of like plain vanilla. There are a lot of competitors, and the market will consolidate over time. The more exciting players are the ones working on unique formulations, on novel delivery systems, and are moving cannabis toward a more pharma-like model. Companies that actually own IP and can develop licensed medicines—that’s where the real long-term value is. If you get a unique formulation approved as a licensed medicine, you get 13 years of exclusivity. That’s like FDA approval in the U.S. So companies doing deep R&D and creating new compounds that target specific disease states or chronic conditions—those companies are very exciting. It’s early, and there aren’t many of them yet, and there is not a lot of money in that space right now that is able to support long term cash burn. But if you’ve got a cash-flow positive business that can support a pipeline, and that pipeline shows strong potential for treating diseases, then that’s the next frontier to build companies that will deliver outsized investor returns. It’s about evolving from branded generics to branded pharma.
krautinvest.de: And who is going to equip these upcoming businesses with sufficient capital. We have no specialized cannabis VCs in Europe. In the early days we have seen some acquisitions. Are you in touch with family offices and institutional investors to join your investment rounds?
Will Muecke: One category that’s really growing is what I call “captive VCs.” These are corporate development arms—like a U.S. MSO that wants to break into international markets or a pharma company looking to develop a pipeline based on novel cannabinoid formulations. These captial VCs understand this is one plant, but two very different markets—medical and adult use. In the U.S., we mixed medical and adult use together and it totally distorted the market. Germany, on the other hand, has built a tightly regulated medical industry focused on safety, access, and reducing the illicit market. It’s a safer place to invest. We’re also seeing more U.S. and Canadian companies realize this is going global and that Europe is where they need to be for sustained growth. Plus, corporates from consumer goods, tobacco, and alcohol are showing up with their own investment arms—placing small bets in European projects. And yes, there are still family offices and ultra-high-net-worth individuals in the game, even though some got burned or are already fully deployed. Our job now is to re-educate the generalist investors—to get them to forget everything they think they know about cannabis. We’re in a new era now. Since April 1, 2024, this is Cannabis 2.0. We’ve even got a manifesto for investing in Cannabis 2.0. So don’t look to North America. Don’t look to Canada. Look at Europe. Germany’s already a €2 billion market and growing—its patient base is now comparable to that of Florida. If you want to be in a fast-growing, high-potential market, this is it. The U.S. market is going from $45 billion to $60 billion in three years. Europe will go from €2–3 billion to €6–9 billion over the same period. That’s a phenomenal opportunity. Now is the time to invest in Europe.
krautinvest.de: You’re speaking about Europe. So far it’s mainly Germany… Do you think that others will follow the German model, especially now, when we have a CDU Chancellor, and it looks like the policy is strong enough to survive the new government?
Will Muecke: I do. It’s unfortunate what’s happening in places like Italy, where they’re now calling CBD a narcotic and pulling it off shelves. So, yes, in some places a lack of education and stigma do still exist, which creates setbacks in a few small pockets around Europe. But, overall, stigma is waning, education is improving, and bright spots of real progress are growing all across Europe. France just appointed new leadership to oversee medical cannabis in the country, and France will likely launch the full rollout of its state-sponsored legal medical program in January 2026. That’s going to be a finished-products market, no flower, which is really interesting. Spain’s a bit of a wildcard—the gray market there swings back and forth. Poland is very promising. Then you’ve got smaller countries. Denmark in the Nordics. And the Czech Republic could open in creative ways. And then there are the adult use pilot projects in the Netherlands and Switzerland. Europe’s not doing a “big bang,” where everyone opens up at once—it’s more of a rollout phase, with new markets coming online gradually. We just need to keep showing that the deregulatory trend is real and that new markets are opening. And then it’s about patience. This isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme. We’re building an industry here. And if you’re early, you’ll be well rewarded—the multi billion dollar upside certainly is there, but it will take patience and professional prudence to realize those mega investor returns.
Disclaimer: This interview is part of a media partnership with ICBC. Our readers get 30% discount with the code MJCOMMS30 via this link. Will Muecke will be part of the panel „Global Cannabis Industry Horizons: Key investment insights in the rapidly evolving cannabis industry“ on Tuesday 29th of April 2025 at 11:45am.
About Will Muecke
Will Muecke is a co-founding managing member of Artemis Growth Partners, an ESG and impact-oriented private equity platform dedicated to investing 100% in the cannabis industry on a worldwide basis. Artemis Growth Partners oversees US $400+ million in mission-driven discretionary assets under management (AUM) invested in the global cannabis value chain, including branded products, distributors, value-added service providers, ancillary operators, and science-driven research and development platforms.
Will was co-founding managing partner of CoreCo Private Equity, a 2017 GIIRS-rated „Best for the World“ ESG-focused impact fund backed by investors including the IFC/World Bank, and the multilateral/development banks of Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Belgium, the IADB, UHNW individuals, and US/UK/EU/LatAm family offices (CoreCo was fully deployed as of July 2017). Will was formerly the global co-head of the healthcare services sector in the healthcare investment banking group at Goldman, Sachs & Co. (New York). Prior to that role, Will was co-head of west coast healthcare coverage and co-head of mobile data technology banking at Goldman, Sachs & Co. (San Francisco).
With over 30 years of experience in global finance, Will has extensive expertise in banking advisory, restructuring, debt and equity funding, and merger negotiations across a wide variety of U.S. and international industries, with specific expertise in global cannabis markets and investing. Will resides in London and serves as the chief investing and strategy officer for Artemis Growth Partners.
Disclaimer: Editorial content, no investment recommendation.
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