Asif Alam
CEO
Asif Alam is the Chief Executive Officer at Compliance.ai. A leader in shaping disruptive technology, his experience includes building products using AI and natural language processing for GRC, payments, lending, risk, trading, and new solutions, from Fortune 500 companies to startups.
In his most recent role, he served as the Chief Strategy Officer of ThoughtTrace, unlocking new revenue streams and markets, and reignite portfolio growth. ThoughTrace was then acquired by Thomson Reuters earlier this year. There, Alam designed and launched a new Technology Practice for Thomson Reuters that generated over 150% in Y2 and 180% in Y3 and secured partnerships with enterprises like Amazon, Google, Salesforce, Adobe, and Samsung.
He brings more than 20 years of management and business experience; increasing profitability, unlocking new revenue streams and markets, and reignite portfolio growth for companies like Thomson Reuters, Crux Informatics, and Finastra. Asif is a forward-thinking expert driving engagement via client forums, public presentations, and white papers.
You can find more about Asif Alam at http://www.linkedin.com/in/asifalam
Kayvan Alikhani
Co-founder, Chief Product/Strategy Officer & Board Member
With more than 25 years of experience in hi-tech, Kayvan leads operations, strategy, sales, and marketing for Compliance.ai. Most recently, Kayvan led the identity strategy at RSA, and represented EMC on various industry alliances such as the FIDO board. He is Co-Founder and CEO of PassBan (acquired by RSA), a company focused on mobile identity assurance. Kayvan also led strategy at LiteScape (as CTO and later as CEO), creating security and mobile identity solutions for VOIP based networks. He was Co-Founder and CTO at BeNotified, a cloud mobile communication service provider. Prior to that, Kayvan co-founded AVIRNEX, a cloud-based enhanced fixed and mobile communication service provider.
Kevin Jacques
Board Member
Kevin Jacques joined Cota in 2021 as a Partner. Prior to Cota, Kevin was Vice President and Head of Corporate Ventures at Visa. During his tenure at Visa, Kevin led the company’s venture investment efforts serving as lead partner on over 25 FinTech transactions. Prior to Visa, Kevin spent seven years at Intuit directing Corporate Development and Investments. At Intuit, Kevin and his team completed over 30 acquisitions, seven divestitures, four direct corporate venture investments, as well as 11 FinTech venture fund investments with total deal value approaching $2B. Prior to Intuit, Kevin spent nearly 12 years as a venture capital partner with Sevin Rosen Funds and Palomar Ventures. Kevin was also the CEO of Globeranger, an RFID middleware provider, and a consultant at The Boston Consulting Group. Kevin received a B.S. in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University and an M.B.A. from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
Ben Malka
Board Member
Ben Malka joined Cota in 2019 as a Partner on the investment team, where he is focused on sourcing, evaluating, executing and governance of venture investments. Prior to Cota, Ben was a General Partner at F-Prime Capital, a San Francisco-based financial technology and enterprise IT-focused venture capital fund. At F-Prime, he served as lead partner for a number of investments, including Snapsheet, Vestwell, Toast Inc, and Blispay. Since 1999, Ben has also served as a General Partner at North Hill Ventures, a financial technology focused venture capital fund. At North Hill, he was the lead partner for investments in Compete Inc, Placemark Investments, Paychoice, Simple Tuition/Valore Books, CashStar, and FSV Payment Systems. Previously, Ben was with The Boston Consulting Group, where he was the Project Lead for a number of clients across strategy development, acquisition strategy, new product evaluation and operations improvement. He began his career at Bank of America as a Statistical Analyst. Ben graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Political Science from Stanford University and a MBA from the University of Chicago.
Bobby Yazdani
Co-Founder & Board Member
Bobby Yazdani is Founder and Managing Partner of Cota Capital, a firm investing in private and public technology companies. Bobby has successfully mentored entrepreneurs and invested in over 100 early-stage startups. In 2014, Bobby was ranked #1 out of 2000 angel investors for successful follow-on funding by CB Insights. In 2015, Bobby endowed the Signatures Innovation Fellowship at University of California, Berkeley to support data science projects with commercial promise.
