Sunny Washington: Launching curiosity.

• Author: Kinder, Peri
• Position: (Around Utah Spotlight

Sunny Washington knows all about momentum. After leaving the banking industry following 9/11, Washington turned her focus to tech and has continued to move forward ever since.

Working with educational tech companies like Instructure and Certiport, she developed a passion for STEM education, especially experiences that give students real-life science knowledge. This led to the creation of her company Because Learning--formerly Ardusat--in 2014.

Jumping into the startup world, Washington was astounded by the magnitude of fundraising she had to do to get financing for her company.

"There are so many challenges as a startup: getting customers, getting traction and finding venture capital. It's even more difficult for women, which has become more apparent to me," she says. "Women get 7 percent of venture capital funds, and that number is getting smaller and smaller."

As a woman of color, she finds that percentage is even lower-just .2 percent, according to a recent CrunchBase Women in Venture report. Washington is a first-generation American. Her parents came to the United States from Seoul, South Korea, raising their family in Orem. She lived in Europe during her teenage years but returned to Utah County to attend Brigham Young University.

Her original plan was to build her edtech company in San Francisco, but she discovered distinct benefits for staying in Utah, even though she's found it difficult for women to create startups in the state.

"I don't fit the cookie cutter mold. [Venture capitalists] fund who and what they're familiar with. Women don't get the same consideration and have to prove themselves more to get the same level of treatment and the same level of funding," says Washington.

Even with these challenges, Washington raised $1 million in 2015 to fund product development and growth. Initially, Because Learning partnered with a satellite company, Spire, to use its small CubeSat satellites launched from the International Space...