Protests Erupt As Data Startup Cogito Fires 177 Indian Employees

New York and Delhi NCR-based automation startup Cogito has fired 177 employees after the project they were working on was scrapped, leading to protests by the impacted employees.

According to a report by a local media platform Tricity Today, the impacted employees alleged that they were not given any notice by the company. The employees protested at the startup’s office on Friday (April 28), following which the Noida Police had to step in to control the situation, according to a LinkedIn post.

The Tricity Today report, citing employees, said that when they reached the office on Thursday, they were told by their respective managers to not come in the next day as there was no project left with the company for them to work on.

The employees claimed they didn’t receive any response from the management when they questioned the startup’s decision to fire them without giving any notice. They also alleged that the company didn’t pay them salaries.

However, the company’s management refuted these claims. Speaking with Inc42, Cogito CTO Rohit Agrawal said, “Due to the current market environment, a client of ours decided to abruptly ramp down their operations,” which led to the 177 employees working on the project being let go.

According to Agrawal, 85 of the impacted employees were on probation. The company currently has more than 1,500 employees in India, the CTO added.

Agrawal also claimed that the employees were paid April salaries and they were satisfied with the company’s actions. 

When asked about the police presence at the company’s office, the CTO said that some of the impacted employees had called the cops. However, the police were satisfied after looking at the employment contracts and asked the employees to disperse. 

Founded in 2006 by Rohan Agrawal, an alumnus of John Hopkins University and Manipal, Cogito offers training data-as-a-service (DaaS). It provides B2B customers with data and helps them build their business applications.

The layoffs come at a time when India’s startup ecosystem is reeling under the chill of the funding winter. This has forced startups to fire employees to cut costs and increase their runway. According to Inc42’s ‘Indian Startup Layoff Tracker’, over 92 Indian startups have fired over 25,000 employees since the start of 2022.