Factory and Cognition dispute Christopher Dagnan’s move to Cognition

Factory’s Matan Grinberg said he terminated Christopher Dagnan’s role as a Factory adviser and board observer after learning that Dagnan’s discussions with Cognition executives had been formal and recurring for weeks while he remained involved with Factory. Grinberg said Dagnan advised Factory on confidential board matters on Monday and that he did not know how much information Dagnan may have shared. Dagnan joined Cognition as chief revenue officer. Grinberg accused Cognition of trying to obtain Factory information, including through purported interviews and by directing resources toward people with knowledge of Factory’s confidential plans; the excerpts do not establish that such people were hired or that information was transferred.

Cognition CEO Scott denied the allegations, saying Dagnan had not shared Factory information and that Cognition had never asked him or its team to collect information about competitors. Factory and Cognition were described as growing quickly in a large, rapidly expanding market, where competition was not yet necessarily zero-sum.