May 03, 2023

Ken Fichtler on Using Digital Tools To Detect Worker Impairment

33 minutes

"There has been no device historically that can detect cannabis impairment in real time. Cannabis works very differently in the body than does alcohol. So you can measure the amount of alcohol in the body and derive the experienced impairment from that number. The same is not true of cannabis."

In this episode, I’m in conversation with Ken Fichtler, the founder and CEO of Gaize. Cannabis is now legal in many places where oil and gas is produced, refined and distributed. Cannabis is increasing in potency, people consume it more, and it lasts longer in body than alcohol, but with different impairment impacts. Without a better way to detect impairment, companies may simply not bother with any testing. Ken set out to find a digital solution to this problem, which is way harder than it sounds, but Gaize is now ready for prime time.

"Is there a way we can currently detect cannabis impairment? And the only thing that I could find were these drug recognition, expert eye tests."

Ken Fichtler is the founder and CEO of Gaize, a first of its kind real-time impairment detection platform. Gaize uses analyzes eye movement changes using artificial intelligence to discover impairment from cannabis and other drugs. He’s a prior founder, proven operator, angel investor, and most recently served as Director of Economic Development for the State of Montana under Governor Steve Bullock. There he was responsible for adding thousands of jobs paying radically more than the state’s average wages, recruited leading technology companies to the state, and managed the economic response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ken lives in Missoula, Montana with his family where he enjoys a broad variety of outdoor activities and serves on several boards.

"Each class of drug has a unique bio signature that manifests in the eyes. And that basically just translates to a unique way in which the eye movement changes in response to that drug or to the impairment from that drug."

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