- Joined Cognition
- Jul 2025
- How they joined
- With Windsurf
- Before Windsurf
- Code AdvisorsInvestment Banking Associate
- Status
- Former
Overlapped before Cognition
“Thank you, Scott Wu, Russell Kaplan, and the entire Cognition team for leading with compassion and true partnership throughout the process. Onward!”
Details
LocationSan Francisco, California, United States
Company sitecognition.ai
UniversityThe Wharton School
Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A)FundraisingAccountingAnalytical SkillsInvestor PresentationsFinanceInvestment BankingCommunicationTeam ManagementLeadershipMicrosoft OfficePowerPointMicrosoft ExcelSolar PVPublic SpeakingResearchSocial MediaMicrosoft WordCoStarTreppTenant RepresentationSQLFinancial ModelingCustomer ServiceFinancial AnalysisSalesforce.comInvestment StrategiesData Analysis
Notes
- Became VP, Finance at Cognition in Jul 2025 when Cognition acquired Windsurf; LinkedIn shows the role ending Oct 2026 and his headline now reads 'Ex-Finance @ Cognition'.Oct 2026
- Named by Windsurf's Graham Moreno among the small group (with Jeff Wang, Scott Wu, Russell Kaplan, Kevin Lu, Adam Mishcon) whose 72-hour push got the Cognition acquisition of Windsurf done.Jul 14, 2025
- Joined Windsurf (then Codeium) as Head of Finance in Feb 2024 after leaving Code Advisors in Sep 2023, a jump from tech/media investment banking to running finance at an AI coding startup.Feb 2024
- March 2026 LinkedIn post argues finance teams should ask whether their systems can feed AI clean, real-time, structured data, not 'how do we use AI?'Mar 24, 2026Most finance teams asking "how do we use AI?" are asking the wrong question. The right one is: can your systems actually give AI something to work with? Clean data, real-time, structured in a way agents can consume. That's the hard part, and where all the leverage is. Got to dig into this at the Operators Guild CFO Summit. Modern tools like Rillet make it possible for us. Thanks for having me Casey Woo, Molly Gunderson, Nicolas Kopp, stephen hedlund
- Publicly thanked Scott Wu, Russell Kaplan and the Cognition team for 'leading with compassion and true partnership throughout the process' the day after the acquisition announcement.Jul 15, 2025Thank you, Scott Wu, Russell Kaplan, and the entire Cognition team for leading with compassion and true partnership throughout the process. Onward!
- Rillet case study: Windsurf's outsourced accountants quit because transaction volume outgrew them. He quoted them as saying they 'threw their hands up in surrender', which pushed him off QuickBooks and Excel onto Rillet.
- Ran Windsurf's finance function as a two-person team with offshore bookkeepers in the Philippines. After the Rillet rollout, month-end close wraps in the first few days and Stripe reconciliation is fully automated.
- Investment Banking Associate, Technology & Media, at Code Advisors in San Francisco from Feb 2022 to Sep 2023.Feb 2022
- Spent Aug 2017 to Feb 2022 at RBC Capital Markets in New York (Analyst, then Associate) after a 2016 summer analyst stint there.Aug 2017
- Public headline says "Ex-Finance @ Cognition".
- Quoted: 'Rillet feels like it was tailor built for Windsurf and our complex accounting needs...' The same piece describes Windsurf running finance with a two-person team at $100M ARR.
- Says automation moved his own work toward strategic guidance and long-term planning with the CEO. He called Rillet's revenue module 'an absolute lifesaver' as Windsurf changed its business model 'feels like quarterly'.
Experience
VP, Finance at Cognition
Jul 2025 - Oct 2026
San Francisco, California, United States
Head of Finance at Windsurf
Feb 2024 - Jul 2025
Mountain View, California, United States
Investment Banking Associate at Code Advisors
Feb 2022 - Sep 2023
San Francisco, California, United States
Technology & Media
Associate at RBC Capital Markets
Jan 2020 - Feb 2022
New York, New York, United States
Analyst at RBC Capital Markets
Aug 2017 - Jan 2020
New York, New York, United States
Summer Analyst at RBC Capital Markets
Jun 2016 - Aug 2016
New York, NY
Summer Analyst at Savills North America
Jun 2015 - Aug 2015
Philadelphia, PA
Education
The Wharton School
Jan 2013 - Jan 2017
Bachelor of Science in Economics, Concentration in Finance
AchievementsRan Windsurf finance with a two-person team through scale to ~$100M ARR · Part of the deal team on Cognition's July 2025 acquisition of Windsurf · 2015 Ivy League Champion, Penn football
Recent posts
July 2025
Thank you, Scott Wu, Russell Kaplan, and the entire Cognition team for leading with compassion and true partnership throughout the process. Onward!
March 2026
Most finance teams asking "how do we use AI?" are asking the wrong question. The right one is: can your systems actually give AI something to work with? Clean data, real-time, structured in a way agents can consume. That's the hard part, and where all the leverage is. Got to dig into this at the Operators Guild CFO Summit. Modern tools like Rillet make it possible for us. Thanks for having me Casey Woo, Molly Gunderson, Nicolas Kopp, stephen hedlund
November 2024
Absolutely blown away by what’s possible with Windsurf + Cascade. The best part for me? No software development experience required.
Talks
Press
Awards2015 Ivy League Champion (Penn football) · 2012 Delaware County Player of the Year · 2012 Inter-Ac League Player of the Year · 2012 Mini Maxwell Award
Profiles
