NewsOct 23, 2026, 12:33 UTC

Robinhood's public venture fund puts $10M into AI coder Cognition

What's the deal? Robinhood Ventures Fund I has invested roughly $10 million in Cognition, the AI coding startup behind autonomous software engineer Devin. The stake was part of Cognition's September Series E, which raised more than $2 billion at a $48 billion valuation, joining backers including Andreessen Horowitz, Accel, and Founders Fund.

Why now? It is Robinhood Ventures' second AI bet of the year, after a $75 million investment in OpenAI in April. "It's not a winner-take-all market," said Sarah Pinto, head of Robinhood Ventures, noting the firm now backs rivals in the crowded coding-agent space.

By the numbers: Cognition said its annualized revenue run rate hit almost $900 million in September, up from $492 million in May. That growth accompanied a sharp repricing: the Series E valued the company at $48 billion, nearly double the $26 billion it fetched in a $1 billion round in May.

What's the endgame? Robinhood Ventures Fund I is a publicly traded closed-end fund that began trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol RVI in March. It gives everyday investors exposure to private companies such as Databricks, Revolut, and ElevenLabs — stakes retail buyers usually cannot reach directly.

What could go wrong? Cognition's Devin competes with OpenAI's Codex, Anthropic's Claude Code, and GitHub Copilot. Its steep valuation is a bet on sustained growth and enterprise adoption, not proof that a durable leader has emerged.

The signal: By opening private AI bets to retail investors through a listed fund, Robinhood is testing a new route into the venture market — one that spreads risk across multiple contenders rather than picking a single winner.