HAVN Life Sciences’ mission is to “unlock human performance and empower people to achieve their full potential” through natural health products and psychedelic-based medicines. The company was founded in 2020 and is based in Vancouver. Its team is composed of several cannabis industry and psychedelic science experts alongside pharmaceutical and other business executives. CEO Tim Moore is a veteran cannabis executive. Advisors in the psychedelic field include Dr. David Mokler, a neuropharmacologist and psychopharmacologist with experience researching 5-HT2A receptors and David King, an expert in drug science and policy and the co-founder of european psychedelic conference Breaking Convention.
HAVN is involved in research, extraction, formulation and delivery, with the help of multiple partnerships. The company’s business model revolves around two divisions: HAVN Retail and HAVN Labs. HAVN Retail sells nutraceuticals and supplements containing herbs and mushroom varieties such as reishi, lion’s mane, cordyceps, and chaga. A new health products line was launched in the summer of 2021 with plans to expand in 2022. HAVN Labs oversees product development and specializes in standardized extraction of therapeutic compounds, which it uses in formulations provided to academic institutions.
In 2020, HAVN was permitted by Health Canada to work with psilocybin, which is sourced from a grow in Jamaica. The company has its own research facility in Vancouver but also conducts studies at other labs, such as an investigation into psilocybin’s effects on the immune system at Dr. Geoffrey Bove’s biomedical center in Maine. Other areas of research in which HAVN has participated – including through funding or medicinal supply – involve psilocybin’s potential to treat depression and veterans with PTSD.
In June 202, HAVN acquired clinical stage IP from Bolt Therapeutics. The drug combination includes an unrestricted, non-hallucinogenic analogue of LSD (“BOL-148”) and a compatible neuroprotectant. The acquisition will support HAVN’s patent application and advance preclinical research on the formulation as a treatment for cluster headaches.