Gary Vaynerchuk. On September 15, 2020, it was announced Constellation Brands acquires craft spirits producer Copper & Kings American Brandy. In February 2022, Constellation was reported to have approached Monster Beverage to enter into a merger with a combined valuation above $90 billion. Cannabis In 2017, the company began investing in medical marijuana. In March 2019, Bill Newlands became CEO. In October 2017, Constellation agreed to pay about C$245 million ($191 million) for a 9.9% stake in Canopy Growth Corporation, a Canadian seller of medicinal-marijuana products. At the time of the agreement, Constellation became the first Fortune 500 company and the first major alcoholic beverage maker to take a minority stake in a marijuana business. In August 2018, the company announced that it would invest an additional US$4 billion in Canopy Growth Corporation in advance of the legalization of recreational cannabis in Canada in October that year. The investment will increase its share in the Canadian Company to 38%. Canopy Growth president Bruce Linton said the additional funds would be used for international expansion and that future marketing plans included products such as cannabis-infused beverages and sleep aids. Controversies In 2010, a French court in Carcassonne, France, convicted 12 wine traders and producers for selling fake pinot noir wine to buyers in the US, amongst them Constellation, in a scheme that lasted from January 2006 to March 2008. Constellation later faced and settled a class action lawsuit because it "should have known" that the wine was fake. In 2018 Constellation Brands was involved in a water rights dispute over a proposed manufacturing facility in the desert city of Mexicali, Baja California, Mexico. This water comes from the Colorado River, which not only provides Mexicali and the agricultural valley but is also piped to the mountain and coastal cities of Tijuana, Tecate, Rosarito and to some areas of Ensenada. In 2021, AB InBev sued Constellation Brands after the company launched two new Modelo-branded beers on the US market, arguing that the first beer illegally used the term tequila to describe the barrels where the beer was aged, and that the second beer was inappropriately using the term Bourbon to describe the barrels where the beer was aged because Bourbon has nothing to do with Mexico. References External links Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange Companies based in Ontario County, New York Food and drink companies based in New York