Draft:Adam Bierman

Adam Bierman is an American businessman and entrepreneur. He is best known for co-founding the cannabis retailer MedMen The Apple Store of Weed with partner Andrew Modlin, where he was CEO from 2010 until 2020.

Early life and education
Bierman was born in Scottsdale, Arizona. He attended Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts for one year, then Los Angeles City College in order to pursue baseball more seriously. He transferred to USC, dropping out shortly after the transfer went through to pursue his career building his sports agency.

MedMen
In 2010, Bierman and Modlin had been running a branding, consulting, and construction firm in California when a dispensary owner, they call her the “blue-haired lady”, who was generating $300,000 a month and was looking for advice on how to double that.

In September 2012, the ModMan name was changed to MedMen and the DBA was filed. Bierman’s exclusive trade became legal marijuana. The licensing applications for medical dispensaries in Massachusetts opened in 2013 and Bierman briefly did some consulting into the application process. After realizing how the business model was moving forward in the cannabis industry, MedMen made the switch from consultancy to a management firm. He also penned opinion articles on the cannabis industry for multiple outlets.

Over the next decade, Bierman grew MedMen to five states, with a total of 33 retail stores, and over 1,500 employees. It also became a publicly traded company with a $1.65 billion market cap. In January 2020, Bierman agreed to step down from his role as CEO of MedMen to assume a more strategic board position.

PharmaCann Acquisition
In late 2018, MedMen signed a deal to acquire PharmaCann for $682 million, the largest acquisition in U.S. cannabis history. Bill Barr and the Department of Justice opposed the deal and due to the dirty politics, the merger was terminated in October 2019.

Venture Funding and Capital Raises
Bierman was able to secure millions in venture funding for MedMen. In April 2016, Cap-Meridian Ventures invested $15 million. Two months later, Bierman launched Opportunity Fund I, which raised $60 million in 9 months. The following year, Opportunity Fund II launched, securing $75 million in 6 months. Bierman continued to pursue investments into MedMen in 2018. In October, Bierman secured a loan for $94 million, one of the first true senior secured loans in cannabis. A few days later, the loan increased to $100 million. In March 2019, Bierman helped MedMen secure a $250 million investment deal with Gotham Green Partners, which raised an additional $30 million in July. In December, Wicklow Partner also invested an additional $27 million.

Legal issues
Bierman was the target of several allegations, ranging from mismanagement of money to personal biases. Most of these allegations arose out of a lawsuit in 2019 from former MedMen CFO Parker, of which the jury found no proof, and ruled in favor of MedMen and Bierman. In regards to this lawsuit, Bierman stated, “He clearly threw anything he could fabricate against the wall to see if it would stick. The problem is, as the jury found, none of it was true."

In January 2019, Bierman and Modlin were subjects of a lawsuit from a shareholder entity in MedMen, claiming breach of fiduciary duty. The lawsuit was dismissed in June of the same year. In 2022, Bierman was awarded a $3 million total in his lawsuit against MedMen for wrongful termination.