Windsurf
- Cognition announced it will buy Windsurf days after Google hired Windsurf's CEO and top executives.Cognition's CEO says all Windsurf staff will be "well taken care of" with immediate equity vesting.OpenAI had previously planned to acquire Windsurf for $3 billion.
What's left of the AI coding startup Windsurf will be acquired by its competitor Cognition, the two companies just announced.
Google announced on Friday that it had hired Windsurf's CEO and other key executives and licensed its technology, leaving Windsurf's future as an independent company in doubt. This also meant a previous deal with OpenAI to acquire it was off.
Now, Windsurf interim CEO Jeff Wang says Cognition's acquisition will be a "perfect fit" that would provide endless opportunities for engineers to "100x" their productivity. The terms of Cognition's deal, announced Monday, weren't disclosed.
"The last 72 hours have been the wildest rollercoaster ride of my career," Wang posted on LinkedIn.
Cognition didn't immediately respond to a request for comment, and Windsurf declined to comment.
Cognition, which is backed by Khosla Ventures and Founders Fund, raised a $175 million round last year, only six months after launching. Cognition was last valued at $4 billion, Bloomberg reported, raising hundreds of millions more this year.
Windsurf's investors include General Catalyst and Kleiner Perkins. It has raised over $200 million, according to PitchBook.
OpenAI previously planned to buy Windsurf for $3 billion, Bloomberg reported. Talks fell through over the Windsurf CEO's opposition to sharing intellectual property with Microsoft, Business Insider previously reported.
Questions about the Google deal
In a note to staff that Cognition cofounder and CEO Scott Wu posted on Monday, he announced that all Windsurf employees would benefit financially from the acquisition and there would be no waiting period for their stock to vest.
He wrote that every single Windsurf employee would be "treated with respect" and "well taken care of."
Over the weekend, questions had swirled about the Google deal, especially what impact it would have on employees whose equity had not yet vested.
Amjad Masad, CEO of rival vibe coding platform Replit, for example, urged Windsurf employees to join his startup, saying that Replit has passed on many acquisitions and was "building for the long haul."
Cognition's plans for Windsurf
Cognition said the acquisition would supercharge its AI software developer product, Devin.
Windsurf's Wang also poked fun at Anthropic, which cut off access to some of its latest AI models after the news broke that Anthropic's rival OpenAI was in talks to buy Windsurf.
"And, of course, we're friends with Anthropic again," Wang said in the announcement.
