Cognition acquires Poke in low nine-figure deal to bring conversational AI to coding agent Devin

AI coding startup Cognition has acquired Poke, an AI assistant known for its conversational and personality-driven interaction model, in a deal valuing the startup in the "low nine figures," according to reporting by TechCrunch. The acquisition is intended to bring Poke’s interaction style to Cognition’s coding agent, Devin, with the goal of making the tool feel less like software and more like a colleague.

Poke distinguishes itself by engaging users in a familiar, friendly manner, incorporating slang and humor into its responses rather than functioning strictly as a tool. This approach is expected to enhance Devin’s user experience by making interactions feel more natural and enjoyable. Cognition co-founder Scott Wu emphasized this vision in a blog post, stating that the team aims to build Devin to feel "proactive, it knows you, and it’s fun to talk to."

The deal follows Cognition’s prior involvement with Poke as angel investors, with Wu and co-founder Walden Yan having invested in the company behind Poke before the acquisition. Poke was first launched in March 2026 and allows users to interact with its AI agent via messaging platforms such as iMessage, SMS, Telegram, and WhatsApp. Its most common use cases include productivity tasks like managing emails, reminders, and to-dos.

Cognition indicated that Poke will benefit from its models and infrastructure to become faster and more reliable. Over the past three months, Poke users exchanged more than 100 million messages, though the company noted that high operational costs had made profitability challenging. Poke recently became the first AI agent approved to run on Apple’s Messages for Business platform, a standardized system for business communications within Apple’s Messages app.

Looking ahead, Poke will continue operating on Apple’s platform through the end of 2026, with plans to experiment next year on integrating Cognition’s SWE-1.7 model for certain tasks. Long-term, the companies have not ruled out fully combining the two products. Poke’s conversational interface could help Devin manage multiple tasks across sessions, such as orchestrating multiple pull requests or maintaining task continuity, potentially making Devin feel like a "persistent co-worker."