“Can an autonomous AI software engineer become the operating system for enterprise software development at scale?”
Founded in late 2023 by a trio of elite competitive programmers, Cognition initially explored cryptocurrency before pivoting to AI software engineering post-ChatGPT. The March 2024 launch of Devin — marketed as the first autonomous AI software engineer — defined the company's identity and catalyzed rapid funding escalation from a $329M Series A pre-money to a $26B post-money valuation by May 2026. The July 2025 acquisition of Windsurf marked a strategic expansion from a single agentic product toward a broader developer-tooling platform. Cognition's embedded finance footprint is minimal, with Stripe handling payment processing as the sole confirmed vendor.
Cognition Scott Wu processes payments through Stripe.
Cognition Scott Wu was founded by Scott Wu, Steven Hao and Walden Yan and is founded in 2023, headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States.
Cognition Scott Wu has raised $996M+ in total (latest round: Series C (or growth round), May 2026; valuation: $26B post-money (May 2026)).
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