Towards a Cognitive Computer

Generative AI has unlocked a cognitive era for computing, allowing computers to interact with the world in novel ways, through vision, speech and text. Since most data in the world is messy and unstructured, this cognitive core is enabling computers to operate in the real world that humans inhabit without needing to rigidly structure and translate data into fixed forms.

We are going to build a new kind of computer — one that always has perfect context about a person, team, and organization; connects to every tool and service a user authorizes; and anticipates needs while orchestrating tasks with humans and AI alike. A personal computer which gets more personalized the more you use it. The AI apps of tomorrow will be built by connecting to the core services provided by this computer — contextual memory, orchestration and authentication.

The Cognitive Era of Computing

Each computing revolution transformed what was once scarce and centralized into an easily available commodity:

• 1940s-1960s: Mainframe Era - Scarce computing cycles shared by many, with humans queuing to use room-sized machines.
• 1970s-1990s: Personal Computer Revolution - Microprocessors made computing power personal, placing it on every desk and in every home.
• 2000s-2020s: Mobile & Cloud Era - Infinite storage and ubiquitous connectivity made computing ambient, seamlessly integrated into daily life on the go.

Today, the fundamental building blocks of computing — storage and compute — are joined by a new dimension: cognition. LLMs have shown that reasoning can exist as software.

We have abundant compute, storage and connectivity, yet knowledge workers remain burdened with manual context-switching, constantly serving as human middleware between fragmented services. This high-friction context management is also an issue in AI applications; we just call it by a different name (prompting).

Anatomy of a Cognitive Computer

A cognitive computer represents a fundamental shift in computing architecture — an intelligent software substrate designed to:

• Perceive everything you see, hear, read, or log.
• Remember continuously, with instant, permission-aware recall (the right context at the right time).
• Reason holistically from comprehensive, always-updated context.
• Act seamlessly across all tools, APIs, databases and SaaS applications.
• Interact with the user with just-in-time generated UX (chat, form, email, voice).

The Cognitive Computer is a new kind of operating system with LLMs as its "CPU", context as its RAM, memory as its long-term storage, and connectors (drivers) to tools, services, applications and the base OS to accomplish any task.

Today's AI applications are all "AI for X" solutions. These vertical solutions face inherent limitations:

• Siloed Context: Vertical AI lacks horizontal visibility, missing insights that cross domains.
• Rigid Boundaries: Real-world work spans multiple workflows, forcing humans to manually bridge gaps and context across today’s AI tools, often manually.

The cognitive computer flips this approach, providing a horizontal cognitive foundation: the cognitive OS. Specialized cognitive programs then leverage this shared context, eliminating manual integration and maximizing coherence.

Towards a Truly Personal Computer

The cognitive computer will deliver personalized intelligence at every level:

• Individual Scale: Acts as a personalized cognitive partner ("chief of staff"), anticipating your needs, understanding your communication style, preferences and tasks — automating away routine work.
• Team Scale: Functions as an invisible orchestrator ("program manager"), proactively identifying dependencies, managing shared objectives, resolving conflicts and ensuring team alignment.
• Organization Scale: Operates as an organizational nervous system, continuously monitoring financials, compliance, customer feedback, and market dynamics, proactively surfacing actionable insights and strategies.

A single cognitive kernel dynamically adjusts context and permissions without losing coherence.

Unlike today's specialized, siloed agents — coding assistants, marketing bots, or scheduling helpers — cognitive programs operate horizontally across an organization's systems. They can help with on-call, calendar scheduling, marketing and communications, company operations and every other function in an organization. They have perfect context to operate optimally in each of these environments.

Our Vision

We envision that cognitive intelligence will exponentially increase people's potential; amplifying their productivity with hyper-personalization, perfect coordination and richer decision making.

The mainframe era lasted 30 years, the PC era 25 years, and the mobile era is going 20 years strong. The cognitive era starts now, and we're committed to building it.

Our vision is to build a cognitive computer to empower people, teams and organizations.

A cognitive computer everywhere for everyone.

Onward,