Overview

• Prem Qu Nair revealed that he received just 1% of his expected payout and forfeited all vested shares from his 3.5 years at Windsurf.
• He turned down a same-day job offer from Google DeepMind to join Cognition’s team developing the autonomous coding agent Devin.
• Cognition’s follow-up acquisition of Windsurf’s remaining assets comes with accelerated vesting schedules and enhanced equity participation for employees.
• The split sale followed a collapsed $3 billion OpenAI bid and a $2.4 billion Google DeepMind acqui-hire securing a non-exclusive license to Windsurf’s core technology and 42 engineers.
• Industry observers warn that fragmented M&A deals in AI risk undermining traditional startup incentives and could draw increased regulatory scrutiny.