Episode 35 of Bloom features an interview with Chelsey Reschke, who joined Voran Group Ventures to help bring innovative antimicrobials to market.
Her background is in oil and gas, specializing in corrosion and surface chemistry. She had a good job with Stantec when the Voran Group opportunity came up.
"OK, I'm going to leave a really stable corporate job and go back into the land of entrepreneurship. How do you feel about this?" she recalls telling her husband. But it wasn't much of a negotiation. "He knows this is really my calling, so how can you hold that back?"
The opportunity was to help Voran commercialize a German-invented cleaner and disinfectant called Bacoban, navigating the regulatory processes, figuring out how to manufacture it here at scale, and getting it to customers. That's the kind of catalyzing power that Reschke brings.
"I've never been the inventor," she said. "But I've always been the person that's able to pluck those ideas down from the cloud and find all of the pathways that they need to get through, all the hurdles that need to be overcome, all the dollars that need to be applied strategically, and the right people to bring life to this product and get it into the hands of the end consumer."
Learn more about Reschke's vision for the future of Voran Group and the Edmonton region, as well as what she wants to bring to the world stage as a delegate to the G20 Young Entrepreneurs' Alliance summit in Germany, in the Oct. 27 episode of Bloom's podcast about innovation in Edmonton.