DETECTING EMOTIONS IN THE TECH WORLD

By Aakash Ghadge

Born in Odisha and raised in various parts of India due to transferring job of her father, Kanan Tandi, the co-founder of CogniCue, had travelled across the country. The joint family setup and inter cast marriages in the family gave her an opportunity to understand multiple cultures and languages. As a student, Kanan had always been extraordinary but she had been very average in extra-curricular activities. Kanan had multiple aspirations just like any other growing youth but her destiny lay in something very special and today she runs a very successful startup.

“I initially wanted to become an astronaut and then I wanted to become Indian Idol, so like many others, I was basically clueless about what to do! I also prepared for the civil service, but failed drastically and later pursued MBA from Symbiosis followed by MSc (Clinical Psychology) f r o m J a i n U n i v e r s i t y , Bangalore I just could not settle in any one of them so I started learning the NonVerbal Communication and Psychology. Finally, I founded my first company called “Body Speaks Better” and I gained k n o w l e d g e i n M i c r o E x p r e s s i o n s r e a d i n g , decoding voice and body and deception detection I met Fasih, my co-founder in 2018, and found out he is an amazing coder. We started hanging out together and one f i n e d a y , w e s t a r t e d CogniCue, which is into Emotion Detection, a SaaSbased platform.” Speaking about her journey t o w a r d s b u i l d i n g t h e CogniCue and her Cofounder Fasih, Kanan said “I started as a science student in my 12th, but later, moved to h u m a n i t i e s I h a d a n opportunity to have several other courses and work in a different field. It is only after meeting Fasih, who I found to be very focused, that changed my perspective From a distance, he looks like any other coder, but when you talk to him, you will know instantly that he knows his field in and out. He has been coding since he was 11 years of age. To start a tech company, we need two things: technology and domain. Fasih & I really make a strong team, as we both are bringing our own expertise to the table. Initially, we worked for 18 hours to train our system through data. The uniqueness of CogniCue is that we are covering all three channels of c o m m u n i c a t i o n w h i c h currently no other startup is offering.”

The CogniCue startup has been funded by FiiRE, and speaking on that Kanan said, “Initially, we were making an Emotion Detection platform but at that point in time, we did not have a clear idea of which market to focus on. We started with Edtech, then moved to HRTech. We did not have many clients, nor was the revenue generating The amount we received as CCD, was very helpful to sustain initially because we had to travel for conferences The main learning is making a 'must have' feature and selling it to a ' needy” market' . S p e a k i n g a b o u t t h e challenges she said, “We faced multiple challenges. For funding related issues, how to sell, who to sell, how to make the first connection, which is the right marketplace etc. In short, related to any startup whatever problems are being faced, you name it, and most likely we might have faced it. I can tell you which is the area where we did not face the challenge That will be the technology and feature building and research & development.”

According to Kanan getting incubated with FiiRE has helped them a lot and it increased their exposure to a very different level “The constant support from FiiRE has also been there Other than that, Nasscom played a very important part in making it big for us. Initially, we were part of the 10,000 startups initiative and then we got into Deep Tech Club as well. Both the programs are of Nasscom and they also keep pushing the startups and making the right market connections for startups like us,” she said. About future plans she said their future plan is to enter into the BFSI sector entirely. “This is a sector where we are solving some real issues for the sector. So, what we are doing is analysing consumer videos during loan disbursements and insurance claims and providing them various metrics which can give them a risk score and a trust score, based on that they can move ahead with the said consumer”. The CogniCue has specialised in Detecting Emotion “We are better than most of the emotion detection startups present in our country. Also, collectively we are at 88% of accuracy, but with continuous improvement and rigorous R&D, the overall accuracy will only be increased in the near future. This is also going to act as a speed breaker for a fraudulent consumer because they will be told that they are going to be recorded for t h e s a i d purpose We are looking at a significant reduction in fraud cases in the future,” said Kanan

“I feel that I am probably the best example of doing what you like and keep figuring things out unless you find the one. I have worked in multiple fields only to settle down with Psychology There is some area that is close to your heart, but it does not really give you money. There are fields that will give you money but not really the peace of mind. We need to find an area of work, which will give us both. It takes time, but if the effort is continuous then eventually, we will find it. So, keep figuring things out and fail faster to learn new things,” she concluded.

Sangita Hadfadkar