Not only do our products help students retain their knowledge, but they make educators’ lives easier, too, as we include lesson plans, auto-graded assignments and quizzes, lecture slide decks, and more. Unlike traditional publishers, our courseware and simulations are always on the industry’s leading edge. Because our materials are digital, we update them on an annual basis. Our staff and our authors are committed to keeping our materials current, which means our users always have access to the latest trends, best practices, and strategies. We are proud to put the best course materials  into the hands of students and educators all over the world. I tell people that what Under Armour was to Nike and Adidas, that is what Stukent is to Pearson and McGraw Hill.

What inspired you to start Stukent?
Several years ago, I taught a marketing class at Brigham Young University-Idaho and discovered something unexpected… all of the course materials from traditional publishers were outdated. The marketing industry was evolving faster than academic publishers could revise, print, and distribute their textbooks, which made it difficult to prepare their students for the challenges of the real world.
So, I started Stukent. Our mission is to help educators help students help the world, and we do that by addressing the gap between dynamic, fast-moving industries and academia. Since 2013, we’ve helped thousands of educators prepare more than 500,000 students for today’s competitive job market. And we’re not stopping there — we are going to continue to innovate and inspire, find new verticals, and bring better tools to more classrooms all over the world. We’ve also begun to make our simulations available to businesses for training their professional teams.

How has the east Idaho startup ecosystem grown in the last 5 years?
I don’t know that the east Idaho startup ecosystem has grown much in the last 5 years as it relates to supporting entrepreneurs that need funding. There aren’t any new institutional investors. There are no incubators, or business plan competitions available to the public that I am aware of. There is a network of high networth individuals that are willing to make seed-round investments in startups, but it is challenging for entrepreneurs to know where to go to connect with these folks.
Without local venture capital and private equity groups, being on the Inc 5000 list four years in a row garnered a lot of attention from these groups for me and eventually led to a very successful partnership with Tritium Partners just last year.

What challenges exist in the EdTech space?
There are long sales cycles in education and most of the revenue is generated just a few months of the year due to the seasonality of the business. This was especially challenging in the early days of Stukent.
As an industry, EdTech tends to have high customer churn — we aren’t immune to that issue at Stukent. Educators, particularly those in higher education, may only teach a course for a semester or two; and while those educators may love our products, we sometimes struggle to connect with the new educator assigned to teach the course.
The Stukent team has expanded over the last few months, which will allow us to broaden our horizons and develop products in exciting new subjects. We want to have the best solutions for the educators who rely us, each and every time.
Additionally, educators may hesitate to implement new curricula or methodologies into their pedagogical practices. Traditional textbooks, with all their limitations, are what educators know, and educators don’t like change! So our customer success, sales, and marketing teams work to make our customers’ transitions from traditional textbook to current courseware and simulations as smooth as possible.

What makes Idaho a great place to start a business?
The people. Good people. Down-to-earth people. Humble, hard working people. Friendly people.
People used to fear that you couldn’t run a tech company from Idaho. Just ask BEA and Micron. Idaho is more than just potatoes. We have the internet here too!
Idaho is a great place to run a business — the state’s economy is booming, and its population is growing faster than anywhere else in the country, save maybe Utah. The Gem State currently ranks in the top ten for GDP growth and net migration, while its sales and property taxes remain low. Plus, more than half of the state’s workforce is employed by small businesses.
With all these factors in mind, it’s easy to see why Idaho is so good at nurturing startups and small businesses!
Additionally, Idaho is a great place to live. There are good reasons it’s the second fastest-growing state in the U.S., including low cost of living, wide-open spaces, and abundant opportunities for adventure.

What does LeanLaw do, and how is it differentiated from other companies in the industry?
LeanLaw is the financial operating system for small and mid-sized law firms. We make subscription software that automates law firm timekeeping, billing, trust accounting and reporting workflows, integrates deeply with other business-critical software, and produces key data insights and reports. We are unique in the industry because (1) our focus is on the law firm’s finances, not all-in-one practice management; (2) we integrate deeply with the industry leader QuickBooks Online for accounting rather than producing a built-in accounting tool; and (3) we focus on mid-market law firms, with our sweet spot in firms with 25 to 75 users. For a mid-sized law firm that wants to use QuickBooks Online, and doesn’t want built-in practice management, LeanLaw is the only choice.

How has the process of raising capital changed from your first deal?
We have raised several tranches of seed capital since 2015. We have a number of shareholders who have made multiple investments, and generally the checks are getting larger. Our 2015 raise was $405,000. In 2022-23, we expect to raise $4 million to $5 million. This will include our first investments from institutional investors, which will require significantly more preparation, due diligence and sophistication in our execution than our
prior efforts.

How does LeanLaw plan on using its 2021 seed funding?
We are cresting over $1 million ARR, and are in the process of scaling the company. The primary components of this effort are building proper demand and sales engines and expanding our engineering and product teams to build out our product vision more quickly. The 2021 financing has helped finance these initiatives.

What are some challenges around developing a tech-based team?
Hiring is difficult today. Part of our response to this challenge has been to embrace a work anywhere culture. Since the beginning of 2021, we have grown the team from 5 to 25 people and over half of our team is located outside of Idaho. We hear this is now the norm for SaaS companies outside of major tech hubs. Having a remote team requires focus on creating a cohesive culture, which is not easy but ultimately creates an effective and fun work environment.

What makes Idaho a great place to run a business?
What sets Idaho apart is the openness and accessibility of the business community and elected leaders. People have been welcoming and helpful all the way from investors and entrepreneurs to the mayor and governor. There is a strong entrepreneurial spirit here that helps overcome some of Idaho’s historical challenges like access to capital (which has improved dramatically over the last few years).

What advice would you give to founders raising capital?
An advisor told us that investors ask themselves two questions: (1) can I trust these people? and (2) How do I get my money back? Answer these questions well and you will not have trouble raising money. The first question is really difficult at the beginning because there is so much you don’t know. You need to convey confidence you can navigate through that uncertainty to success. This is always a difficult tightrope to walk. Our best advice is honesty is the best policy. As to the investor getting her money back, it is important to be clear and consistent. Are you building a company to own or to sell? If to own, how does the investor get a return? If to sell, what are your realistic expectations about when and how you are going to get the company to exit. With that said, the most important thing is never to give up. If you look at things with clear eyes and still know in your bones you are creating something of value, you will find a way to succeed. Ultimately, raising capital is simply the outcome of your determination.

Any exciting plans for LeanLaw in the near future?
We are building a cutting-edge workflow for the financial life cycle of a law firm’s client from onboarding through payments that will fundamentally change the way law firms convey the value of the firm’s work to their clients. In doing so, LeanLaw will capture an important revenue share of the hundreds of millions of dollars our clients bill through our platform.