Cohere vs Scale AI: Founders, CEOs and History
Cohere was founded in 2019 by Aidan Gomez, Ivan Zhang, Nick Frosst and is led by Aidan Gomez. Scale AI was founded in 2016 by Alexandr Wang, Lucy Guo and is led by Francis deSouza.
Company facts
Founders
Cohere
Aidan Gomez
Aidan Gomez is co-founder and CEO of Cohere. As a Google Brain intern he co-authored 'Attention Is All You Need' (2017) with seven other researchers.
Ivan Zhang
Ivan Zhang is a co-founder of Cohere. Before Cohere he co-founded FOR.ai, an open research collective, with Aidan Gomez. At Cohere he has worked on the engineering and infrastructure that serve the company's models to enterprise customers.
Nick Frosst
Nick Frosst is a co-founder of Cohere. He was Geoffrey Hinton's first hire at Google Brain's Toronto lab, where he published research on capsule networks and adversarial robustness.
Scale AI
Alexandr Wang
Alexandr Wang co-founded Scale AI in 2016 and was its CEO until June 2025. He led the move from self-driving data into language-model training data and U.S. defense work, and Forbes named him the youngest self-made billionaire in 2022.
Lucy Guo
Lucy Guo co-founded Scale AI with Alexandr Wang in 2016 and led early product and design work. She left in 2018 and later founded the venture firm Backend Capital and the creator platform Passes. Lucy Guo was born in 1994. Guo left Scale AI in 2018.
CEOs and their tenures
Cohere
- Aidan Gomez2019–present
Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
As co-founder and CEO, he leveraged his status as a co-author of the seminal 'Attention Is All You Need' paper to secure massive funding from Oracle and Nvidia.
Source - Martin Kon2023–2025
President and Chief Operating Officer
As President and COO (hired away from YouTube), he professionalized the startup's go-to-market strategy, driving significant ARR growth in the highly competitive B2B AI sector.
Source - Joelle Pineau2025–present
Chief AI Officer
Her academic research heavily influences the foundational reinforcement learning techniques used by enterprise AI startups globally.
Source - Francois Chadwick2025–present
Chief Financial Officer
He brought deep operational expertise from his time at Uber to manage the rapid headcount expansion of the AI startup.
Source - Phil Blunsom2025–present
Chief Technology Officer
As Chief Scientist, he directs the core research team, ensuring Cohere's models remain competitive with OpenAI and Anthropic in massive-scale language understanding.
Source
Scale AI
- Alexandr Wang2016–2025
Co-Founder, former CEO and Chairman
Co-founded Scale and ran it until June 2025, when he joined Meta; remains chairman of the board.
Source - Jason Droege2025–2026
Interim Chief Executive Officer
Former chief strategy officer and Uber Eats founder who led Scale through the post-Meta-deal restructuring.
Source - Francis deSouza2026–present
Chief Executive Officer
Former Illumina CEO and Google Cloud COO, appointed CEO effective August 10, 2026 to grow the applications business.
Source
Timeline: Cohere and Scale AI side by side
2016Scale AI
Scale AI founded
Alexandr Wang and Lucy Guo founded Scale in Y Combinator's S16 batch.
2017Cohere
Aidan Gomez Co-Authors 'Attention Is All You Need'
Aidan Gomez and Google Brain colleagues published the landmark paper introducing the Transformer architecture.
2018Scale AI
Lucy Guo departs
Co-founder Lucy Guo left the company.
2019Cohere
Cohere Founded in Toronto
Aidan Gomez, Ivan Zhang, and Nick Frosst founded Cohere to build privacy-first enterprise language models.
2019Scale AI
Series C and unicorn status
Founders Fund led a $100 million round valuing Scale above $1 billion.
2021Cohere
Series A Funding & Multi-Cloud Platform Launch
Raised $40 million Series A led by Index Ventures, debuting its commercial developer API for text generation and embeddings.
2021Scale AI
Series E at $7.3 billion
Scale raised $325 million at a $7.3 billion valuation.
2022Cohere
Strategic Partnership with Oracle Cloud
Formed historic alliance with Oracle, making Cohere the primary generative AI engine embedded across Oracle Cloud Applications.
2022Cohere
Series B Funding
Cohere raised $125 million in a Series B round led by Tiger Global in February 2022.
2023Cohere
Series C Funding at $2.2B Valuation Led by Inovia
Raised $270 million in Series C funding with participation from NVIDIA, Oracle, and Salesforce Ventures.
2023Cohere
Debut on Amazon Bedrock & Release of Embed v3
Integrated models into Amazon Bedrock and launched Embed v3, establishing leadership in multilingual search.
2024Cohere
Launch of Command R and Command R+
Released Command R (March) and Command R+ (April) for enterprise RAG and tool use.
2024Cohere
$500M Series D Funding at $5.5B Valuation
Closed $500 million Series D led by PSP Investments, with participation from Cisco, AMD, and Fujitsu, reaching a $5.5B valuation.
2024Scale AI
Series F at $13.8 billion
Accel led a $1 billion round with Nvidia, Amazon and Meta participating.
2025Cohere
Command A, North and ~$7B valuation
Launched Command A and North, raised $500 million at $6.8 billion, and reached about $7 billion after a September extension.
2025Scale AI
Meta invests $14.3 billion
Meta took 49% at a valuation above $29 billion; Wang joined Meta and Jason Droege became interim CEO.
2025Scale AI
Layoffs
Scale cut 200 full-time staff and 500 contractors in July.
2026Cohere
Reports $240M ARR for 2025
Investor memo showed about $240 million ARR, beating its $200 million target.
2026Cohere
Aleph Alpha merger announced and signed
Announced in April 2026 with a ~$565 million (€500 million) Schwarz Group commitment; definitive agreement signed September 16, 2026.
2026Scale AI
Francis deSouza becomes CEO
The former Illumina chief took over on August 10, 2026.
Acquisitions
Cohere
- Reliant AI2026Undisclosed
- Aleph Alpha2026Undisclosed
- Ottogrid2025Undisclosed
Scale AI
- ICG Solutions2026Undisclosed
- SiaSearch2021Undisclosed
- Helia2020Undisclosed
Questions about Cohere vs Scale AI
Who is the CEO of Cohere Inc. and Scale AI, Inc.?
Cohere Inc. is led by Aidan Gomez and Scale AI, Inc. is led by Francis deSouza. Both serve as the top executive responsible for the company's strategy, operations, and financial performance.
When was Cohere Inc. founded vs Scale AI, Inc.?
Scale AI, Inc. was founded in 2016 — 3 years before Cohere Inc., which was founded in 2019. Scale AI, Inc.'s longer operating history gives it a deeper track record but also potentially more institutional inertia compared to the younger Cohere Inc..
How many employees does Cohere Inc. have compared to Scale AI, Inc.?
Cohere Inc. employs approximately 350 people, while Scale AI, Inc. employs approximately 1,200. Scale AI, Inc. has the larger workforce at 1,200 employees, compared to Cohere Inc.'s 350. A higher headcount does not necessarily imply greater efficiency — it often reflects differences in business model (e.g., manufacturing vs. software).
Where are Cohere Inc. and Scale AI, Inc. headquartered?
Cohere Inc. is headquartered in Canada and Scale AI, Inc. is headquartered in United States. Their different home markets mean they may face different regulatory frameworks, tax regimes, and currency exposure.
Who founded Cohere Inc. and Scale AI, Inc.?
Cohere Inc. was founded by Aidan Gomez, Ivan Zhang, Nick Frosst. Scale AI, Inc. was founded by Alexandr Wang, Lucy Guo.
Which company has a longer operating history — Cohere Inc. or Scale AI, Inc.?
Scale AI, Inc. has been operating for approximately 10 years, making it the more established of the two companies. Cohere Inc. has been in operation for around 7 years. A longer operating history often signals greater institutional resilience and brand recognition, though it can also mean slower adaptation to new market conditions.
Figures come from each company's filings and the sources linked beside them. Amounts reported in another currency are shown in US dollars at an approximate rate and marked with ~. Back to the Cohere vs Scale AI overview