After vapes staved off the extinction of tobacco, a new generation of nicotine products is promising a safer, albeit no less addictive, form of consumption through tobacco-free pouches made popular by the likes of Zyn and Velo. Now, a celebrity-backed upstart called Sesh is trying to challenge those incumbents.
Buoyed by $40 million in venture funding from Palantir cofounder Joe Lonsdale’s 8VC, along with music stars Diplo and Post Malone, Sesh is pitching itself as a safer alternative for cigarette and vape users through so-called white pouches—one of the fastest-growing consumer categories.
While Sesh is competing against Big Tobacco offerings like Philip Morris’s Zyn, its founder and CEO, Max Cunningham, says that Sesh’s independent status—and unique formula, designed by Zyn’s inventor—will make it a formidable opponent. “Not all pouches are created equal,” he told Fortune.
The nicotine wars
A native of British Columbia, Cunningham grew up playing hockey, where chewing tobacco was omnipresent. He shifted to vaping but couldn’t quit the habit until he was introduced to his first nicotine pouches. (Cunningham says he currently goes through about half a can of Sesh, or 10 pouches, a day.)
While pouches are still addictive, proponents argue that their lack of tobacco and combustion reduces the carcinogenic harms associated with cigarettes and vapes, similar to nicotine gum or patches. While U.S. regulators are still trying to wrap their arms around the category, former President Joe Biden gave the Food and Drug Administration supervisory authority in 2022 as it moved to restrict vapes. The vaping startup Juul has seen its valuation plummet 95% amid the regulatory crackdown.
The FDA, however, took a softer stance toward pouches, including soliciting applications from manufacturers, including Sesh, which have been allowed to operate. In early 2025, the agency approved marketing for different Zyn products, including its flavored offerings, which signaled a clear path for other companies that had already submitted applications.
Cunningham characterized Zyn, which has become a cultural totem, as the “800-pound gorilla” in the rapidly growing white pouch space, but he said that Sesh’s updated recipe serves as an advantage. That’s because other companies, whose offerings are based on nicotine salts, cannot update the formulas they submitted to the FDA. Sesh, which was developed by Zyn inventor Thomas Ericsson, uses other chemicals, along with MCT oil, a formula which, the company says, reduces the gum irritation caused by other products.
If the pouch wars are determined by cultural dominance, rather than ingredients, Sesh is also coming well-armed. Its newest funding round includes not just the pop titans Post Malone and Diplo, but comedian Andrew Schulz, who is especially popular with the “podcast bro” crowd.
8VC’s Jake Medwell has been instrumental in helping Sesh scale up, including persuading the startup to move to the venture firm’s home of Austin. Medwell told Fortune he was drawn to Sesh, even though 8VC doesn’t typically invest in the consumer category, because he believed in the startup’s mission of bringing nicotine users to a safer way to consume. “People don’t want to vape anymore,” he said. (Nicotine itself is an unconventional category for venture capital, with many firms placing restrictions on “vice” categories, but 8VC is known for investing in controversial sectors like defense tech.)
Despite Sesh’s goal, the product’s rapid growth raises the question of whether it will also entice new nicotine users, including children. While Cunningham admitted that it would be naive to think that no one underage will try white pouches, he said that Sesh is careful with how it promotes the product, such as not using TikTok. The company also doesn’t broadcast any health claims, though influencers such as Andrew Huberman have touted nicotine’s potential benefits to attention and focus—an alarming development in the view of many public health advocates.
Meanwhile, Sesh continues to grow, with 30 full-time employees and availability in more than 5,000 stores across the U.S. and Canada. Cunningham said the company is on track to grow 500% year over year.
“We’re really trying to raise the standard in nicotine,” Cunningham said. “It’s important for emerging brands like Sesh to exist in the category, and for it not to be just dominated by Big Tobacco.”
Update 9/4: Growth is 500%, not 5,000%.
