Licensed to produce and sell cannabis, South African company Cilo Cybin wants to raise money to develop its other project, based on psilocybin, a hallucinogenic mushroom. (Photo: Shutterstock)

Licensed to produce and sell cannabis, South African company Cilo Cybin wants to raise money to develop its other project, based on psilocybin, a hallucinogenic mushroom. (Photo: Shutterstock)

Cilo Cybin, the company which this week became the first to be authorised by South Africa’s regulators to produce and sell cannabis while working on the virtues of magic mushrooms is considering a listing in Johannesburg…and in Luxembourg, said its CEO, Gabriel Theron. 

On Monday, Cilo Cybin Pharmaceutical (Cilo Cybin) announced that it had received a good manufacturing practice (cGMP) licence and accreditation from the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) for the pharmaceutical manufacturing, product testing, processing and final packaging of cannabis products.

This makes it the largest producer and seller of cannabis in South Africa. Cilo Cybin's products are extracted from a "Durban Poison" strain with high levels of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the main psychoactive chemical in cannabis, and which finds ideal growing conditions there.

But the company plans to work on the virtues of a hallucinogenic mushroom, psilocybin, to tackle other conditions, such as anxiety, post-traumatic stress and depression.

"We are now licensed for the final processing of cannabis THC and CBD products, such as oils, tinctures, topicals, etc. We can also prepare the final packaging and labelling for the end consumer," said the company's CEO Gabriel Theron. "This opens the door for Cilo Cybin to enter global and local markets with our own brand and product range. An exciting and giant leap forward."

"Cilo Cybin has secured the global manufacturing and distribution rights to a US brand, Aunt Zelda's. Mara Gordon, the founder of Aunt Zelda's, has been spotted on Forbes, TEDx and Netflix ('Weed the People') for her knowledge of cannabis, its dosing, treatments and formulations," he explains.

But to enable the company to move faster in its development in a buoyant market, the entrepreneur also told Bloomberg that he plans to go public in Johannesburg (early next year) and on a second market. "We're planning a dual listing with the main board of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, and we're thinking possibly Luxembourg for a secondary listing, or another exchange in Europe.” The company already has a branch in Amsterdam - Global Health Solutions - which is developing a health monitoring tool.

This article was originally published on in French. It has been translated and edited for Delano.