What the business is
A mobile neobank for 18-to-35s offering free deposit accounts on a borrowed bank charter plus discounted gift cards and a carbon-footprint feature
The bet
Young Americans want crypto wallets, trading and DeFi savings inside the same app as their bank account rather than in separate apps
Starting capital
$23M round in 2022, after a $1.7M seed in November 2018 and a $5M seed extension in 2021
How it started
Cogni was founded in 2018 out of Barclays' Techstars accelerator to offer personalized banking for 18-to-35-year-olds. CEO Archie Ravishankar says crypto was not on the agenda at first; the company wanted a financial platform suited to people's lifestyles.
What happened
After crypto took off in 2021 the company decided to build on web3. It raised $23M led by Hanwha Asset Management and CaplinFO with Solana Ventures, FTX Ventures, Ship Capital and others. Planned first product: a multi-chain wallet in two to three months, exchange access through a partner, then DeFi savings accounts on Solana. It had 24 staff in New York and San Francisco and eight in Europe, and was hiring web3 talent and compliance staff.
What has to be true
Crypto became a mainstream lifestyle activity for the 18-to-35 audience in 2021
Neobanks mostly perform the same core functions, so differentiation was limited
Ravishankar believed users wanted wallet, exchange and DeFi savings alongside banking in one app
What can be applied
In a crowded neobank field a niche audience was not enough, so Cogni reframed the same audience's lifestyle spending around crypto; the web3 products were still unlaunched plans at the time.
Aftermath
As of April 26, 2022 the wallet, exchange access and DeFi savings were announced plans; Cogni had 24 employees in the US and eight in Europe and was expanding compliance staff.
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