U.S, April 6, 2020 (CANNABISTECH) Cannabis Tech spoke with Mladen Barbaric, CEO of Airgraft, about vaping safety. Solving-callenges-of-vaping
Why would a team with more than 100 million technology devices on the market to-date get into the cannabis vape business post-vape crisis? The answer: to bring respect for the plant and respect for the consumer back into the market once again.
The multinational team of designers, engineers, and technologists behind Airgraft decided to leap into the vaping market to address key challenges facing the sector in 2020. As Mladen Barbaric, CEO and founder of Airgraft, explained in a recent interview with Cannabis Tech, transparency, safety, and respect for the plant were the core values driving this new vape-tech venture.
THREE CORE CHALLENGES WITH VAPING
Airgraft recognized three critical issues within the cannabis vaping sector today:
- Consumers know little about the substances they’re vaping.
- Most consumers technically aren’t vaping because of poorly designed devices.
- Consumers also understand little about portion control.
Barbaric told Cannabis Tech that one of the industry’s biggest hurdles is the mysterious “brown juice” inside most vape cartridges. Most consumers know little about where their vape products come from, what’s contained inside, or the production process. One brown cartridge is remarkably like another to most consumers.
Without industry-wide standardization and transparency, profits have often come well before concern for the safety, purity, or efficacy of the final product. With so many consumers wanting to vape but a lack of regulation, an explosion of counterfeit, ineffective, or downright dangerous products made their way onto the market.
Leading Barbaric to his second point, most of these vape pens and vape devices aren’t technically even vaporizing the product. The vast plumes of ‘vapor’ so desired by consumers are, in fact, not vapor, no matter what the marketing says.
At its most fundamental level, vaping means to boil a liquid to produce a vapor. Every single liquid has a precise and unique boiling point, including every terpene and cannabinoid contained in cannabis extracts. Current vape devices cannot accurately control the temperature to avoid burning the dozens of heat-sensitive compounds found in cannabis oil. These devices do not optimize temperature according to individual cartridges. This means the large clouds coming from the mouths of consumers are mostly smoke, not the vapor they believe them to be.
Barbaric highlighted a final dilemma facing the vape consumer: portion control. Unlike other methods of consumption, vapor is challenging for the consumer to regulate. Actual vapor is invisible, smooth, and quite different than a smoked product. It’s why so many consumers favor the massive cloud produced by many of the devices in the market today—it’s a visible indication of how much they pulled from the device. This problem of portion control is the third and final, industry-wide issue Airgraft set out to solve with its newly launched clean vape device and SecurePod technology.
KEY DESIGN INNOVATIONS TO REVOLUTIONIZE VAPORIZATION
Instead of relying on diluents, fillers, or carrier oils to improve the consistency of extractions for a vape cartridge, Airgraft has simply demanded a better extract. Inside the Airgraft SecurePod is a pure, unadulterated cannabis extract. It is as far from the problematic “brown juice” as possible. As Barbaric confirmed, it’s a reason why Airgraft has a limited selection of oils. It takes a long time to find extractors capable of producing the quality of oil they need.
Each Securepod is chipped and identified, with consumers easily able to trace the contents through the supply chain and review the lab results of each batch. The pods use encryption technology to eliminate the risk of counterfeits entering the market. Not to mention that they are made from food-grade materials, certified as heat safe by the Food and Drug Administration, Health Canada, and other international regulators.
Beyond the physical design of the SecurePods, the most exciting aspect of the Airgraft launch is the vapor itself. ZeroBurn technology promises pod-specific temperature control. Utilizing batch-specific lab results, Airgraft has optimized the vaping temperature of every single pod to avoid burning the materials.
As an example, that means the autumn 2019 and summer 2019 batches of their Liftoff oil pods, which have subtly different cannabinoid profiles, will heat to a different preset temperature.
Customized temperatures mean absolutely no burn, just pure vapor on every pull. As Barbaric explained, this is “keeping the integrity of the oil intact. We are not breaking down the compounds.” The consumer may initially notice no smoke plume but instead an immediate improvement to taste and experience.
Although several other companies on the market are working on creating the perfect dose of cannabis, Barbaric believes consumers are actually facing a different problem. From his point of view, defining an ideal dose isn’t relevant for cannabis. Depending on physiology, genetics, gender, and tolerance, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to cannabis dosing. Barbaric stated that it’s not dose control, it’s all about proper titration.
Titration is finding the “personal minimal effective dose,” which can (and does) vary from one person to the next. The connected Airgraft mobile app allows users to monitor each pull based on volume based on visual cues. The device and app provide users the tools to replicate their own perfect dose consistently.
A DEVICE TO RESPECT THE BODY AND RESPECT THE PLANT
In one fell swoop, the Airgraft seems capable of ushering in an entirely new vape experience and one without mysterious “brown juice,” counterfeit carts, or dangerous metals.
Instead, Airgraft strives to honor the plant and the consumer. Consumers benefit from a tastier, smoother, and predictable experience, thanks to innovative ZeroBurn and Draw Control technology. How? By a device and products that respect the plant — no diluents or fillers and perfectly paired temperatures.
Is Airgraft going to expand on their technological developments in the cannabis sector? “Of course,” says Barbaric. As Airgraft now has an insider’s perspective, the team has identified many new problems in urgent need of solutions. Barbaric promised exciting announcements very soon.
