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In an industry that operates on hype and grand gestures, Canadian AI company Cohere is charting a different course than Silicon Valley. There is no talk of super-intelligent machines, no public fighting, just one question: Will it make money?
“Cohere is a very low-level theater company,” AI chief executive Joel Pinault said in a recent interview, noting that he has a lot of friends at OpenAI and Anthropic and that Cohere is very different.
The company was co-founded in Toronto in 2019 by Aidan Gomez, an AI researcher who co-authored a seminal paper that laid the foundation for modern AI systems, highlighting the central role of Canada’s AI research ecosystem in advancing the field.
Pinault, who joined Cohere last year after nearly eight years leading Meta’s basic AI research lab, said the company’s low-key approach extends to one of the industry’s hottest buzzwords: artificial general intelligence (AGI), the hypothetical point where AI surpasses human intelligence.
“We don’t spend a lot of time talking about AGI,” Pinault said, dismissing theorizing as a distraction.
Instead, she said, the company is rallying around a decidedly unappealing slogan: “ROI over AGI.” This is a term that refers to the return on investment that much of the cash-intensive AI industry has yet to realize.
Pinault said the company’s focus on enterprise customers has shaped the way it thinks about AI risks, cutting off what she calls the fear-mongering surrounding what-if scenarios.
“There were a number of people who essentially went around scaring people with AI, essentially scaring people, instead of really understanding the real risks,” she said, arguing that the time spent on catastrophe could be better spent addressing concrete safety challenges.
Those real risks, she said, include workforce disruption, data privacy and infrastructure security, concerns that Cohere’s enterprise customers in financial services, healthcare and government are actively addressing.
“People are worried that it will affect their jobs and their ability to earn a living,” Pineau said. “These are perfectly legitimate questions.”
Regarding the competitive threat posed by China’s AI models, he acknowledged the security considerations but pushed back against a framework that would stoke fear. She noted that the risk of malicious code injection through AI-generated software is not specific to any particular country.
“It’s not just the Chinese who can do this. Any developer who decides they want to do this,” there are mechanisms to do so, she said, adding that regardless of the origin of the model, robust safety practices are good hygiene.
“Spicy Take”
Pinault said Kohia is well-positioned to tap into demand in European and Asian markets wary of relying on U.S. technology platforms.
Last month, the company announced a deal to acquire German AI company Aleph Alpha, creating a combined entity worth about $20 billion with headquarters in Toronto and Berlin.
The partnership, backed by both the Canadian and German governments, aims to position Cohere as a sovereign alternative for companies to the US AI giant in European and Asian markets.
“Given the geopolitical context, some of them fear being shut out of U.S. technology solutions,” she says. “We will be happy to suggest alternatives.”
While Kohia will continue to call Toronto its global home, Pinault said the company’s ambitions go far beyond its borders. With offices in San Francisco, New York, London, Paris, and now a growing presence in Germany, its goals are clearly international.
Still, she suggested that a founder’s origins can leave a lasting mark on a company’s character.
“It may have something to do with Canadian folklore. That’s part of the co-founders’ values that will be ingrained,” she says.
Asked whether leaning into more flashy stories, such as a rival company’s warnings about the doom of AI, might attract more investor attention and generate more publicity, Mr. Pineau suggested with a wry smile that going along with it “might get more airtime.”
“Maybe I’ll try a spicy take once in a while,” she added.
