Brazil’s fast-growing $40-million medical-only CBD market has entered a brand new part: aggressive worth cuts which can be reshaping competitors amongst main producers.
Prati-Donaduzzi, certainly one of Brazil’s largest pharmaceutical producers based mostly in Toledo, Paraná, moved first in early July, lowering the costs of three CBD concentrations by as much as 40 %. U.S. operator Ease Labs adopted later within the month, slicing costs for its whole line of merchandise in Brazil by the identical margin. The Charlotte, North Carolina-based firm decreased its 30ml unit from roughly $208 to about $125. The value of a 10ml bottle dropped from $74.50 to $47.
For each firms, the technique is simple: settle for thinner margins with a purpose to develop quantity, lock in doctor confidence, and make merchandise extra inexpensive for sufferers.
Sturdy progress, persistent boundaries
Regardless of excessive costs, Brazil’s CBD market is increasing rapidly. Shut-Up Worldwide, a Brazilian consulting agency that tracks pharmaceutical gross sales, reported that CBD merchandise grew 41.2 % in April 2025 in comparison with the identical interval the earlier 12 months.
Shut-Up separates CBD medicines based mostly on isolate from broader “hashish extract” formulations registered with ANVISA. Medical CBD isolate merchandise represented 52 % of the entire, rising 31.1 % year-on-year. “Hashish extract” merchandise made up the opposite 48 %, growing at an excellent sooner price of 63.8 %.
Survey information from Kaya Thoughts, a São Paulo-based hashish analysis and intelligence firm, present that the variety of medical hashish sufferers elevated by 56 % from 2023 to 2024, reaching roughly 672,000. But affordability stays the primary impediment to therapy, underscoring the importance of the latest worth cuts.
In Shut-Up’s March 2025 rating of CBD firms, Prati-Donaduzzi, Greencare, and Hypera Pharma led the sphere of “hashish extract” producers, adopted by Ease Labs and Biolab Corp. Ease Labs recorded the second-highest progress price, increasing 191.1 % in the course of the interval.
Observers say vertically built-in manufacturing fashions—masking cultivation, extraction, formulation, and distribution—have enabled price reductions and should turn out to be a broader business development.
Jazz not a part of the battle
Absent from this pricing shake-up is Jazz Prescribed drugs, the Eire-based firm that acquired GW Prescribed drugs in 2021 and markets the epilepsy drug Epidiolex. Jazz entered Brazil in 2019 below present rules and sells Epidiolex as a high-concentration CBD drugs for extreme seizure problems.
The rationale Jazz has not joined the value battle is straightforward: it competes in a special class, the place it’s the solely licensed participant. Epidiolex is a totally registered pharmaceutical, protected by patents and backed by medical trials. It’s prescribed for slender indications and follows the identical regulatory path as any new drug, with pricing tied to traditional pharmaceutical economics somewhat than to the aggressive pressures dealing with home hashish merchandise. Market estimates usually are not accessible for gross sales of such specialised merchandise, and Jazz doesn’t disclose Brazil-specific gross sales.
Two classes for CBD
Brazil’s authorized framework explains this divergence. Neither leisure nor medical marijuana is authorized. There are two authorized classes for hemp-derived cannabinoids. One covers registered medicines akin to Epidiolex, which require full medical trials, ANVISA registration, and are usually reserved for extreme circumstances. The opposite class permits “hashish merchandise for medicinal functions” to be manufactured domestically or imported and offered in pharmacies by prescription. These merchandise don’t want full pharmaceutical registration however should adjust to requirements for high quality, security, and labeling.
It’s below the second class that Prati-Donaduzzi, Ease Labs, and different Brazilian firms have launched their merchandise, sparking the present worth competitors. Jazz stays insulated within the first class, targeted on a premium, specialty area of interest.
Alerts from worth battle
The latest worth cuts reveal how Brazil’s CBD sector is evolving. As manufacturing of the uncooked CBD ingredient and completed packaging turns into extra environment friendly, firms can scale back prices and decrease costs. This implies producers have adjusted their objectives to succeed in increased gross sales volumes somewhat than excessive per-unit margins.
The message of affordability additionally resonates with regulators and physicians. By presenting worth cuts as a option to develop entry, firms achieve credibility and place themselves as companions in public well being.
Whether or not different producers comply with with additional worth reductions would be the subsequent check of how sustainable Brazil’s CBD growth might be. For now, the nation stands as an outlier: a big, fast-growing market the place regulatory readability, home manufacturing, and affected person demand are converging, whilst a lot of the world’s CBD business stays unsure.
Broader push for hemp
As the 2 regulated CBD classes are more likely to proceed rising, observers count on the tempo to be gradual, restricted by price, prescription necessities, and regulatory hurdles. Hemp stakeholders are due to this fact urgent for broader guidelines that will enable the crop to succeed in its potential in textiles, meals, building, and bioplastics.
They warn that if Brazil restricts cultivation solely to pharmaceutical manufacturing, the alternatives will likely be slender and delayed, leaving the nation behind friends akin to Uruguay and Colombia which have embraced wider licensing frameworks.
