GW PLANS TO DIVERSIFY FROM ONE-DRUG FOCUS

GW Pharmaceuticals, the medicines-from-cannabis group, plans to sell other
controlled substances, including heroin and methadone, as part of a shift
away from its one-drug focus.

Geoffrey Guy, executive chairman, said he hoped to be selling methadone in
secure drug-delivery devices by the end of next year.

"This adds a completely new income stream for us. As of today, we are no
longer a one-drug company," he said.

The plans form part of a deal with the National Addiction Centre, backed by
the Home Office, for GW to use its devices to treat the nation's 250,000
heroin addicts.

GW believes the tally of 30,000 addicts who currently receive prescribed
methadone or heroin can be doubled within three years.

The group also announced pre-tax losses for the six months to the end of
March of Pounds 5.7m (Pounds 2.2m). There was no turnover.

GW has been criticised in the past for pinning all of its research and
development hopes on cannabis-derived medicines to treat multiple sclerosis
pain and other conditions.

It has nine final-phase clinical trials under way, including four for MS,
with its first cannabis-based product due to be submitted to regulators by
early next year and commercial launch pencilled in for 2004.

GW has Pounds 21.1m of cash reserves, with its burn rate running at an
annual Pounds 12m.

The company also announced yesterday that it had contracted a commercial
vegetable grower to help triple its cannabis production capacity to an
annual 90 tonnes in readiness for commercial launch. That would give it
enough to provide spray-based drugs to 20,000 MS sufferers.

Comment

* GW is starting to look far more than a colourful tale. Using the cannabis
delivery devices to administer other controlled drugs is a clever response
to critics who have dismissed GW as a crackpot high-risk company.
Profitability is still unlikely to come before 2005, but it could be 10
times the Pounds 1m level that was previously being forecasted. The trendy
product focus has never made GW cheap, but the shares' immobility yesterday
- - unchanged at 111p - ignores the scale of the transformation.