Top venture investors say these 11 tech startups in the red-hot cannabis sector are set to blow up this year

Backed by a strategic relationship with Nielsen, the company provides brand managers with insights on price, volume, market share, and buying trends." Startup: Flourish Software Investors: 7thirty Recommended by: Micah Tapman, managing partner 7thirty Relationship: Investor What it does: Flourish provides enterprise seed-to-sale, supply chain, and analytics software for cannabis dispensaries. "The team's prior experience solving similar problems in traditional industry gives them a big advantage when solving the problems of multi-location cannabis firms." Startup: TriGrow Systems Recommended by: Krishnan Varier, principal at Arcadian Fund Relationship: Investor What it does: TriGrow is a cannabis cultivation technology company that provides both hardware and software solutions to cannabis growers. That data is then analyzed against the plant's genomic profile and chemotype to provide actionable feedback to the master grower." "TriGrow launched commercially in 2018, and we believe they are poised to quickly ramp new customer acquisition as more sophisticated cannabis cultivators make investments in automation." Startup: Pax Labs Investors: Tiger Global Management, Tao Capital Partners, Prescott General Partners, Navy Capital Recommended by: Sean Stiefel, CEO at Navy Capital Relationship: Investor What it does: Pax Labs manufactures a line of high-end marijuana vaporizers. "Their initial focus will be to enable the production of pharmaceutical-grade cannabinoids and revolutionizing the way cannabinoid-based medicines are sourced, produced and consumed." "While the market recognizes THC and CBD, we believe the magic is in the minor cannabinoids; and bio-synthetics will provide access to these at a fraction of the time and cost" Startup: Confident Cannabis Investors: Poseidon Asset Management, Bullpen Capital, Y Combinator, Greenfield Global Opportunities Fund, Base Ventures Recommended by: Emily Paxhia, founding partner at Poseidon Asset Management Relationship: Investor What it does: Confident cannabis is a wholesale software platform powered by data from cannabis-testing labs that helps both dispensaries and consumers buy products.