Amarantus Acquires Majority Interest in CBD Wellness Company Hempori

•  Strong customer retention at both stores in Dallas, TX with growing online presence
•  Focus  on delivering wellness solutions by engaging customers to participate in clinical studies and provide outcomes data to determine utility of branded CBD products 
•  Order placed for hemp smokes to begin tobacco smoking cessation program

New York, NY and Dallas, TX , Jan. 30, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- via NEWMEDIAWIRE -- Amarantus Bioscience Holdings, Inc. (OTC Pink: AMBS) (“Amarantus,” or AMBS), a biotechnology holding company pursuing proprietary therapeutics and diagnostics through its subsidiaries, today announced that it has acquired a controlling interest in Hempori, Inc., a CBD wellness retailer in Dallas, TX with 2 stores and a growing physical and online presence. Concurrent with this announcement, Hempori has placed an initial purchase order for hemp smokes from Emerald Organic Products, Inc. (OTCPK: EMOR), an Amarantus partner. Amarantus intends to evaluate a smoking cessation program, with an initial focus of getting feedback on the hemp smokable products from customers who are actively seeking to reduce, or cease, chronic use of cigarettes and/or e-cigarettes

“We are very pleased to have come to an agreement to acquire a controlling interest in Hempori after over a year of due diligence,” said Gerald Commissiong, President & CEO of Amarantus. “We began following Hempori right before they opened their first retail store in December 2018, and have been thoroughly impressed with the attention to detail and care with which Hempori manages its customers. We believe much of the value in the CBD space resides in consumer-facing operations, and that the majority of CBD users have some medical condition for which they are seeking wellness solutions. As such, we believe the concept of health-focused CBD wellness centers fits squarely into the emerging health and wellness landscape.  We intend to work closely with partners to optimize the Hempori experience and expand its footprint regionally and across the United States. Amarantus will work closely with Hempori to put Amarantus’ clinical trial and FDA-related experience to work in order to position Hempori as a brand distribution leader in the CBD wellness solutions space for customers with medical problems.”

Under the terms of the agreement, Amarantus is issuing 25 million shares to Hempori in exchange for 51% of the outstanding shares of Hempori, and was granted an option to acquire the remaining shares from the existing shareholders until December 31, 2020 for additional common stock of Amarantus, or of a successor entity in the event Amarantus is acquired prior to year-end 2020. Hempori generated over $350,000 from its 2 storefronts in fiscal year 2019.

“We are excited to partner with Amarantus who shares a similar vision for helping customers from diverse medical backgrounds find solutions, and capturing the data in a way that may potentially ultimately allow us to make claims that will provide our products with a marketing advantage,” said Grant Magers, MBA, CEO of Hempori. “The time to bring CBD to the masses is now, and we have been focused on providing a top notch customer experience that has led to very high repeat customer rate, with the focus being on education on how to use the our products based upon consumer feedback. This iterative process is the only way to gain a true understanding of how CBD can potentially benefit people, allowing us to establish real-world evidence on which to base future clinical trials that show potential benefit of our products in specific medical conditions. The initial focus on smoking cessation is due to significant inbound demand from customers.”

Five Key Conclusions from recent Surgeon General report on Tobacco Smoking Cessation:

1.     Smoking cessation is beneficial at any age. Smoking cessation improves health status and enhances quality of life. 

2.     Smoking cessation reduces the risk of premature death and can add as much as a decade to life expectancy. 

3.     Smoking places a substantial financial burden on smokers, healthcare systems, and society. Smoking cessation reduces this burden, including smoking attributable healthcare expenditures. 

4.     Smoking cessation reduces risk for many adverse health effects, including reproductive health outcomes, cardiovascular diseases, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and cancer. Quitting smoking is also beneficial to those who have been diagnosed with heart disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. 

5.     More than three out of five U.S. adults who have ever smoked cigarettes have quit. Although a majority of cigarette smokers make a quit attempt each year, less than one-third use cessation medications approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or behavioral counseling to support quit attempts.

NBC News recently provided a summary on this report that  is available at https://www.nbcnews.com/health/vaping/e-cigarettes-lead-people-start-smoking-surgeon-general-says-n1121361 .

About Tobacco, Smoking Cessation and E- Cigarettes

The global tobacco market is expected to grow from USD 689.4 Billion in 2018 to USD 934.5 Billion by 2026 at a CAGR of 3.9% during the forecast period from 2019-2026. Rising use of automated techniques in manufacturing tobacco products and online retailing is further propelling the growth are the two factors affecting the demand of the market.

Smoking cessation (also known as quitting smoking or simply quitting) is the process of discontinuing tobacco smoking. Tobacco smoke contains nicotine, which is addictive and can cause dependence. Nicotine withdrawal makes the process of quitting often difficult. Cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the United States, accounting for more than 480,000 deaths every year, or about 1 in 5 deaths, and more than $300 billion in healthcare costs. Seventy percent of smokers would like to quit smoking, and 50 percent report attempting to quit within the past year. Tobacco cessation significantly reduces the risk of dying from tobacco-related diseases such as coronary heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and lung cancer. Due to its link to many chronic diseases, cigarette smoking has been restricted in many public areas. In nicotine-dependent smokers, quitting smoking can lead to symptoms of nicotine withdrawal such as nicotine cravings, anxiety, irritability, depression, and weight gain. Professional smoking cessation support methods generally attempt to address nicotine withdrawal symptoms to help the client break free of nicotine addiction.

E-cigarettes containing nicotine aren't considered safe for adolescents, young adults or pregnant women. Nicotine can harm brain development in children and young adults into their early 20s and is toxic to developing fetuses. Children and adults have also been poisoned by swallowing, breathing or absorbing e-cigarette liquid through their skin or eyes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In youth and adult nonsmokers, e-cigarette use also poses the risk of a nicotine addiction. This could lead to long-term use of e-cigarettes, the effects of which aren't known, or to the use of traditional cigarettes. Research has shown that teen use of e-cigarettes is on the rise and associated with increased future use of traditional cigarettes. Rarely, e-cigarettes can cause severe harm. Defective e-cigarette batteries have caused fires and explosions, mostly while the batteries are being charged.

About Hempori

The Hempori brand is active in the Hemp industry and has over 75 products that are sold in its own stores in Dallas, Texas and online via Hempori.com.  Hempori has developed unique proprietary products in the Hemp industry and is actively engaged with researchers to gather data regarding the utility of its products.

About Amarantus Bioscience Holdings, Inc.

Amarantus Bioscience Holdings (AMBS) is a JLABS alumnus biotechnology company developing treatments and diagnostics for diseases in the areas of neurology, regenerative medicine and orphan diseases through its subsidiaries.

Diagnostics

The Company‘s 80.01%-owned subsidiary Breakthrough Diagnostics, Inc., currently a joint venture with Todos Medical, Ltd. has licensed intellectual property rights to the Alzheimer’s blood diagnostic LymPro Test ® from Leipzig University that was originally developed by Dr. Thomas Arendt, as well as certain rights to multiple sclerosis diagnostic MSPrecise™ and Parkinson’s diagnostic NuroPro. Amarantus entered into a joint venture agreement with Todos Medical, Ltd. (OTCQB: TOMDF) to advance the diagnostic assets, and Todos has exercised its exclusive option to acquire Amarantus’ remaining ownership in Breakthrough in exchange for approximately 49% ownership of Todos. The transaction is expected to close in the frist half of 2020. Amarantus also owns approximately 30% of the common shares of Avant Diagnostics, Inc, a tumor analysis company developing Theralink®, the proprietary phosphoprotein tumor analysis platform run using reverse phase protein array (RPPA) platform.

Therapeutics

AMBS’ 50.1%-owned subsidiary Elto Pharma, Inc. has development rights to eltoprazine, a Phase 2b-ready small molecule indicated for Parkinson's disease levodopa-induced dyskinesia, Alzheimer’s aggression and adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, commonly known as ADHD. AMBS acquired Cutanogen Corporation from Lonza Group in 2015 and currently owns 90.1% of that subsidiary. Cutanogen is preparing for pivotal studies with Engineered Skin Substitute (ESS) for the treatment of pediatric life-threatening severe burns. ESS is a regenerative medicine-based, autologous full-thickness skin graft technology originally developed by the Shriner’s Hospital that can be used to treat severe burns, as well as several other catastrophic and cosmetic dermatological indications. AMBS’ wholly-owned subsidiary, MANF Therapeutics Inc. owns key intellectual property rights and licenses from a number of prominent universities related to the development of the therapeutic protein known as mesencephalic astrocyte-derived neurotrophic factor (“MANF”). MANF Therapeutics is developing MANF-based products as treatments for ophthalmological disorders such as Wolfram Syndrome, Retinitis Pigmentosa and Glaucoma, as well as neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s disease. MANF was discovered by the Company’s Chief Scientific Officer John Commissiong, PhD. Dr. Commissiong discovered MANF from AMBS’ proprietary discovery engine PhenoGuard, and believes several other neurotrophic factors remain to be discovered. MANF and ESS have been licensed to Emerald Organic Products, Inc. 

For further information please visit www.Amarantus.com, or connect with the Amarantus on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+. 

Amarantus Investor and Media Contact:

Gerald Commissiong

President & CEO

Office: 650-862-5391

Email: [email protected]

Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This letter contains forward-looking statements, about the Company’s expectations, beliefs or intentions regarding, among other things, its product development efforts, business, financial condition, results of operations, strategies or prospects. Forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking words such as “believe,” “expect,” “intend,” “plan,” “may,” “should” or “anticipate” or their negatives or other variations of these words or other comparable words or by the fact that these statements do not relate strictly to historical or current matters. Forward-looking statements relate to anticipated or expected events, activities, trends or results as of the date they are made. Because forward-looking statements relate to matters that have not yet occurred, these statements are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from any future results expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Many factors could cause actual activities or results to differ materially from the activities and results anticipated in such forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, the factors summarized in the filings with the SEC.   Amarantus does not undertake any obligation to publicly update these forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.