NJOY is Back From Bankruptcy

The NJOY name will continue to be a part of the American vapor products market. NJOY, LLC, has acquired the assets of NJOY, Inc., as part of NJOY, Inc.’s financial restructuring after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year.

The new company has raised $35 million in capital equity, and will move forward without debt. Most of the capital investment came from Mudrick Capital Management, an investment firm that specializes in corporate turnarounds.

“Today marks a fresh financial start for the NJOY brand,” said Douglas Teitelbaum, chairman and CEO of NJOY, LLC, in a press release. “With the completion of this acquisition and capital raise, we now have ample liquidity and can focus on delivering for our customers. I am excited to have the full support of our equity owners. As a former smoker who long ago switched to NJOY products, I sought to buy the company so that I might enable as many adult smokers as possible to make the switch I did. I am, therefore, particularly excited, on a personal level, to have the opportunity to represent the great NJOY brand.”

The new NJOY’s core mission is “to offer millions of adult smokers satisfying, non-combustion alternatives to traditional combustion tobacco products.” The company also claims to be “fully prepared to operate within the framework of the FDA’s recently enacted final regulations,” and says it has already begun the process of pursuing premarket tobacco authorizations (PMTA).

NJOY, Inc., is most famous for the Sottera decision, in which the U.S. District Court held that the FDA could not regulate vapor products as unregulated drug delivery devices. After Judge Richard Leon ruled for Sottera (as NJOY, Inc., was then known), the FDA appealed. In December 2010, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Judge Leon’s decision, and the FDA began the long process of regulating vape as tobacco products.

NJOY, Inc., was founded by Arizona attorney Mark Weiss. After blu E-Cigs was bought by Lorillard in 2012, the company became the largest e-cigarette manufacturer in the U.S. not owned by the tobacco industry. NJOY, Inc., used its strength to pursue advocacy, fighting to keep the market viable.

NJOY, Inc., was primarily a manufacturer of disposable cigalikes. But three years ago, the company made a stab at entering the gourmet e-liquid market. Despite the quality of the product, NJOY, Inc., was caught between its core convenience store business and the new vape shop market. It never really found a place in the open-systems world, and lost traction in c-stores as the tobacco companies used their distribution power to push the independents out of the cigalike market.