NEW YORK – Hound Labs said today it has closed a $30 million Series D financing round to support faster manufacturing and commercial availability of its alcohol and marijuana breathalyzer.
Intrinsic Capital Partners, a private equity firm that funds businesses in the cannabis industry, led a group of investors that also included NFP Ventures, Main Street Advisors, Icon Ventures, and Benchmark.
Hound said it will use the funding as it moves into the next phase of manufacturing the Hound marijuana breathalyzer, which it claims can identify recent marijuana use within two to three hours of consumption. The breathalyzer would be limited to law enforcement, employer, and insurance use to determine when marijuana was consumed illegally.
In a statement, Howard Goodwin, partner at Intrinsic Capital Partners, said that the legalization of marijuana has created a need for technology that can be used to differentiate legal and responsible use of cannabis from its illicit use.
"With commercial production of its marijuana breathalyzer already under way, Hound Labs is optimally positioned to meet the pent-up demand for the only tool that measures recent marijuana use without identifying someone who legally consumed marijuana the prior night or last weekend," he said.
Recent research from the University of California, San Francisco found that breath is a viable way to measure marijuana usage within three hours of smoking pot, the time window when a smoker is typically most impaired.
Hound Labs, which is based in Oakland, California, noted that existing methods for testing cannabis use— which are based on saliva, blood, urine, and hair — cannot distinguish recent use from long-term use. As a result, employers and law enforcement are prevented from taking "fair actions" against individuals who have legally and responsibly used pot "the night before and is no longer impaired when the testing occurs."