The product
Koko is born
As part of my PhD, I ran a randomized-controlled trial on the platform that would eventually become Koko. The results were remarkable—not just in clinical outcomes but also in the feedback. What helped people the most wasn’t the advice they received, but the help they gave to others. It turned out that supporting others reduced their own depression symptoms. This discovery laid the foundation for Koko’s core mission: empowering people to help one another.
With this momentum, I teamed up with two seasoned entrepreneurs, Kareem Kouddous and Fraser Kelton, and Koko was officially born. The name “Koko” was chosen for its warm and approachable feel. If you look closely at our logo, you’ll notice the letters “ok” are linked, symbolizing our mission to make people feel "ok"—to offer them hope in their moments of need.
We raised funding, got press attention, and soon had thousands of people on a waitlist. The Koko community was passionate about helping each other, and we began to experiment with AI to moderate conversations and identify users in crisis. Our AI, Kokobot, wasn’t perfect, but it allowed us to scale quickly and partner with platforms like Tumblr and Pinterest. In just a few years, we had reached nearly two million people.
The results were staggering. We published academic papers, garnered praise from leading psychologists, and appeared in books, podcasts, and documentaries. But as we grew, our mission remained the same: to provide immediate, actionable mental health support through peer-to-peer encouragement and evidence-based tools.