{"id":229231,"date":"2026-03-18T15:33:49","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T15:33:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/18\/microsoft-hires-the-team-of-sequioa-backed-ai-collaboration-platform-cove-techcrunch\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T15:33:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T15:33:49","slug":"microsoft-hires-the-team-of-sequioa-backed-ai-collaboration-platform-cove-techcrunch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/18\/microsoft-hires-the-team-of-sequioa-backed-ai-collaboration-platform-cove-techcrunch\/","title":{"rendered":"Microsoft hires the team of Sequioa-backed AI collaboration platform, Cove | TechCrunch"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The team behind <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/cove.ai\/\" target=\"_blank\">Cove<\/a>, a Sequioa-backed startup that was working on an AI-powered collaboration board, has joined Microsoft, according to an email sent to customers informing them that Cove\u2019s service is shutting down.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cove was founded in late 2023 by Stephen Chau, Andy Szybalski, and Mike Chu, who worked on Google Maps features like Street View. The startup <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2024\/10\/08\/former-google-maps-engineers-get-sequioa-backing-to-build-out-an-ai-powered-collboration-board\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">raised $6 million in a seed round<\/a> from Sequoia Capital, Elad Gil, Homebrew, Adverb, Scott Belsky, and Lenny Rachitsky in 2024.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Its tool was an infinite whiteboard that let users use AI to generate different blocks for tasks like trip planning. The founders felt that the chat interface for AI was not editable, and a canvas provided more flexibility when going in different directions with prompts. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cove also allowed users to use a built-in browser, PDFs, and images to give more context to its AI, which could create new cards, tables, and lists. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The startup competed with the likes of \u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2022\/01\/05\/visual-collaboration-company-miro-valued-at-17-5b-following-400m-in-new-funding\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Miro<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2022\/12\/16\/tldraw-offers-a-collaborative-whiteboard-without-any-login\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">TLDraw<\/a>,\u00a0and <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2023\/12\/21\/meet-kosmik-a-visual-canvas-with-an-in-built-pdf-reader-and-a-web-browser\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Kosmik<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><span class=\"wp-element-caption__text\">Image Credits: Cove<\/span><span class=\"wp-block-image__credits\"><strong>Image Credits:<\/strong>Cove<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The company said in an email to customers that the entire Cove team is joining Microsoft and the product will shut down on April 1, and all user data will be deleted. Cove mentioned that it has refunded all subscriptions for March and is offering a <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/cove.ai\/migration\" target=\"_blank\">data export process<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhen we started Cove, we set out to reimagine how people collaborate with AI. As model capabilities have accelerated, our conviction in that mission has only grown stronger. We\u2019re thrilled to continue this work at Microsoft AI, where we\u2019ll have the opportunity to pursue an even bigger vision,\u201d the company <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/cove.ai\/blog\/an-exciting-next-chapter\" target=\"_blank\">said in a blog post on its site<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In addition, the company said that \u201cthe ideas behind it [Cove] will live on\u201d within Microsoft. Notably, Microsoft added Copilot to its own collaboration product, <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.microsoft.com\/blog\/2023\/09\/21\/announcing-microsoft-copilot-your-everyday-ai-companion\/\" target=\"_blank\">Whiteboard<\/a>, in 2023. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">TechCrunch reached out to Microsoft to understand how it plans to integrate Cove\u2019s technology within its ecosystem, but did not immediately hear back. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2026\/03\/18\/microsoft-hires-the-team-of-sequioa-backed-ai-collaboration-platform-cove\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The team behind Cove, a Sequioa-backed startup that was working on an AI-powered collaboration board, has joined Microsoft, according to an email sent to customers informing them that Cove\u2019s service is shutting down. Cove was founded in late 2023 by Stephen Chau, Andy Szybalski, and Mike Chu, who worked on Google Maps features like Street [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":229232,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-229231","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tech"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}