Cohere, led by Martin Kon and founded by former Google AI experts, focuses on generative AI for enterprises, distancing itself from the consumer chatbot trend.
“If you’re looking for vehicles for your field technical service department, and I take you for a test drive in a Bugatti, you’re going to be impressed by how fast and how well it performs,” said Kon in a recent CNBC interview. “What you actually need is a fleet of F-150 pickup trucks,” he added. “We make F-150s.”
With a $270 million funding round in June, valuing the company at $2.2 billion, Cohere has attracted attention from Salesforce, Oracle, and even participated in AI forums at the White House.
Kon informed CNBC that they do not comment on rumors, adding that it had been mentioned to him that startups are always in the process of raising funds.
Despite the generative AI sector receiving a record $29.1 billion investment in 2023, Cohere stands out by catering exclusively to businesses, avoiding the broader consumer market targeted by competitors like OpenAI and Anthropic.
“I’ve rarely seen, in my career, many companies that can successfully be consumer and enterprise at the same time, let alone a startup,” said Kon, before saying: “We don’t have to raise billions of dollars to run a free consumer service.”
This strategy has allowed Cohere to maintain efficiency and control costs amidst challenges such as chip shortages and rising GPU prices. Its client list includes notable names like Notion, Oracle, and Bamboo HR, mainly in banking, financial services, and insurance. Unlike many rivals, Cohere has avoided conditional investments, even from backers like Nvidia, as it transitions to Nvidia’s H100 GPUs for powering its AI models.
