The frenzy in the cavernous Green Valley Ranch Resort ballroom might have passed for any confab of entrepreneurs pitching their business plans to pokerfaced angel investors — until an organizer took the podium for a public service announcement.

Please stop smoking weed out by the parking lot, he implored. Hotel security did not approve.

The gathering last week of several hundred Wall Street types, tech industry disrupters, agricultural enthusiasts and assorted others shrugged and went back to the business at hand: leveraging the legalization of marijuana into a windfall.

The pot business is exploding. The devotees and Deadheads toiling away since states started legalizing medical marijuana nearly 20 years ago now must compete in a radically different business culture.

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