Washington startup wins $205,000 at Flywheel Investment Conference

WENATCHEE — 2025 Flywheel Investment Conference, securing $205,000 in funding to advance its sea urchin ranching technology.

OoNee won the overall competition at the eighth annual conference held May 21-23 in Wenatchee, earning a $155,000 investment offer from the Flywheel Angel Network and a $50,000 relocation award from NCW Tech Alliance. MarineSitu, a marine monitoring company spun out of the University of Washington, took home the $5,000 fan favorite award.

The awards bring total Flywheel Investment funding to just over $1.7 million distributed to early-stage Washington startups since 2018.

OoNee addresses overpopulation of purple sea urchins that threaten Pacific Northwest kelp forests by harvesting undernourished urchins and fattening them in land-based modular raceways housed in shipping containers. The process transforms the urchins into premium seafood within weeks.

"We're still a little shell-shocked," said Aaron Huang, CEO of OoNee. "I really appreciate the community and the investors seeing what we're trying to do for the environment. It's incredibly validating."

The company vertically integrates harvest, ranching and processing operations, training commercial divers to collect the urchins before rapidly fattening them in proprietary systems.

MarineSitu develops underwater hardware combined with artificial intelligence-driven software that reduces marine data processing times by 20 times while delivering over 95 percent classification accuracy. The technology serves customers in energy, aquaculture, hydropower, infrastructure and environmental monitoring sectors.

Six finalists competed in the live pitch competition: Pioneer BioFuels, NewGEM Foods, Grace & Able, OoNee, LensBase and MarineSitu. Each founder had seven minutes to present their startup before a packed audience, followed by investor questions.

"We are thrilled to see OoNee win the 8th Annual Flywheel Investment Conference," said Dr. Sue Kane, CEO of NCW Tech Alliance. "Their innovative approach to sustainable seafood is exactly the kind of forward-thinking solutions we need. We're excited to support their journey and we hope that their success is an inspiration to others."

The three-day conference drew investors, entrepreneurs and business leaders from across the Pacific Northwest to Wenatchee and East Wenatchee for networking and deal-making activities.

Conference sessions included panels on university-driven innovation featuring Gliding Ant Ventures, University of Washington and Western Washington University; deal-making insights from Alliance of Angels, FUSE Fund and Tri-Cities Angel Alliance; and a women in artificial intelligence panel spotlighting female founders from WTIA, Certifi AI, Subi and Barclo Venture Studios.

Other programming covered agricultural technology innovation with Carbon Robotics, Voyager Capital and innov8.ag, along with clean energy and aerospace innovation sessions featuring speakers from Stoke Space and Group14 Technologies.

Keynote presentations were delivered by Callie Christensen of Slumberkins and Sierra Clouse of Barclo Venture Studios.

The conference was presented by Clark Nuber and Microsoft, and directed by NCW Tech Alliance. Event sponsors included Peoples Bank, Holland & Knight, Freestone and the Salcido Group.

Past Flywheel investment award winners include Cartogram (2018), Agtools (2020), Iasis Molecular Sciences (2021), BrainSpace (2022), ZILA Works (2022), GemaTEG (2023), Gnara (2023), Alphi (2023), Dopl Technologies (2024) and OneCourt (2024).

NCW Tech Alliance, a 501(c)3 nonprofit founded in 1999, serves as North Central Washington's technology hub, supporting entrepreneurs, advancing STEM education and promoting technology adoption throughout the region.