Goldman Sachs leads $25 million funding in Cogito to expand its AI coaching system to more organizations

Cogito, a Boston, MA-based tech startup that enhances the emotional intelligence of phone professionals by applying behavioral science through artificial intelligence, today announced it has raised $25 million in funding to accelerate the development of new capabilities that enhance the performance of the modern distributed workforce. The round was led by Goldman Sachs Growth Equity (GS Growth) and includes participation from new and existing investors, including Salesforce Ventures.

Founded in 2007 by Joshua Feast and Alex Pentland, Cogito provides human aware technology to help professionals elevate their performance. Cogito’s AI instantly analyzes hundreds of conversational behaviors to provide live in-call guidance combined with a real-time measure of customer experience. Cogito’s software evaluates hundreds of behavioral signals through voice to provide live conversation coaching for agents and a real-time measure of customer experience for every call.

“Our technology shows first-hand the impact of the pandemic on customer and employee behavior. In fact, between February and May of this year, prompts for representatives to display more energy rose 38 percent, and prompts to display empathy increased by 8 percent,” said Joshua Feast, CEO, and Co-Founder of Cogito. “Cogito is uniquely positioned to help improve performance by systematically analyzing and guiding behavior in a personalized yet scalable way. Supporting employees regardless of their location is critical right now, and with this funding, we can ensure more enterprises have access to our enhanced AI Coaching System to help their employees thrive and their businesses grow.”

This latest investment underscores the increasing market demand for technology that understands and augments human behavior. Growing demand from existing customer accounts and partner ecosystems — like Concentrix and the recently announced Amazon Connect integration — serve as strong evidence that companies are turning to innovative technology to drive improved performance. With teams physically separated and looking to deliver personalized coaching in a scalable manner, Cogito’s AI provides objective, real-time guidance for phone professionals, empathetic experiences for customers, and actionable insights for managers and executives.

“The accelerated distribution of the workforce, along with increasing demands for improved customer service, have combined to create a need for real-time employee coaching,” said Mark Midle, Managing Director at Goldman Sachs Growth Equity. “Cogito is well-positioned to capitalize on this market demand with unique AI-based technology, a strong team, and a growing enterprise customer base.”

“Augmenting the natural abilities of sales and service agents through AI is an innovative means by which to bolster productivity and provide a more effortless service experience,” said David Kellenberger, Principal at Salesforce Ventures. “We are impressed with Cogito’s enhanced product capabilities and how they are helping to transform the way our joint customers can build stronger and more productive relationships by leveraging our Salesforce Sales and Service Clouds.”