(Bloomberg) -- Canopy Growth Corp.'s new chief executive officer says job cuts are one of the many options he's evaluating as he works to cut costs across the cannabis company.
“There are no sacred cows,” David Klein said in a phone interview following the company's quarterly earnings call Friday. “We'll look at everything. I think we have to because we owe it to all our stakeholders, including our employees, to get it right.”
Klein, the former chief financial officer of Constellation Brands Inc., became Canopy's CEO one month ago. He took the reins in the midst of a reckoning for the Canadian cannabis industry, where companies grew too fast and sales have been weaker than expected. Jobs have already been cut at many of Canopy's competitors, including Aurora Cannabis Inc., Tilray Inc. and Hexo Corp.
Read more: Canopy Jumps 25% After Beating Expectations Across the Board
Klein was struck by Canopy's lack of “some of the basic blocking and tackling that would exist in a large company,” he said. “Being able to drill into cost reports or being able to understand sales reports from the field or being able to hold people accountable to sales execution standards, some of the things that are basic in businesses don't exist.”
His first priorities are to stop the build-up of cannabis sitting in inventory, reduce capital and operating expenditures and generate free cash flow, he said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Kristine Owram in New York at kowram@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Brad Olesen at bolesen3@bloomberg.net, Steven Fromm
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