Collective Intelligence Collaboratory

What Collective Intelligence Collaboratory does

Collective Intelligence Collaboratory (CICOLAB) is a US-incorporated 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded in 2019 by Lauren Nignon (Paris) and co-led with Charles Blass (Zurich), operating as a virtual peer-to-peer idea incubator or "change tank" for systems innovators — activists, entrepreneurs, academics, and polymaths working on paradigm shifts in economic, social, agricultural, governance, education, and technical systems. Its core offering is a weekly moderated Zoom roundtable every Monday at 3pm EST / 9pm CET, accompanied by a curated knowledge repository of recordings, transcripts, chat logs, notes, Coggle mind maps, and short video wraps stored on YouTube, Workflowy, Miro, and Trello, plus a portfolio of conceptual frameworks including Wisdom Stack, Deep Profiles, Quest Template, Brave Space, and Collaborative Reconciliation.

The technology stack is entirely composed of off-the-shelf SaaS tools — Zoom, YouTube, Workflowy, Coggle, Miro, Trello, Mattermost, and Telegram for community channels — with Otter AI used for transcription. No proprietary platform or in-house models have been built; the organization's "Collective SuperIntelligence (CSI)" concept combining collective intelligence with machine learning is explicitly described as aspirational. The product surface also includes LearninGarden (Kids KooLaboratory), an educational sub-brand for children and families.

The business model is nonprofit and free at the point of use: participation, knowledge access, and community channels are open to the public with no disclosed pricing, sponsorships, grants, or donations data. Go-to-market is community-led, relying on word-of-mouth, social media (Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest), a weekly Mailchimp newsletter, and organic referrals, with no paid advertising. The named team is small (two founders plus Ken Homer as Collaborative Reconciliation Lead), and the organization relies on volunteer contributors rather than traditional employees.

Name

Collective Intelligence Collaboratory

Legal name

Collective Intelligence Collaboratory

Website

https://collectiveintelligencecollaboratory.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2019

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Collective Intelligence Collaboratory is a US 501(c)(3) nonprofit peer-to-peer idea incubator that runs weekly moderated roundtables and curates a knowledge repository to help systems innovators develop radical ideas into functioning ventures, operating entirely virtually using off-the-shelf tools.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Social Innovation Community Services

NAICS

Educational Support Services (611710)

SIC

Services-Educational Services (8200)

akta.pro primary industry

Project-Based/Inquiry-Based Learning (School-Delivered) (EDAJAFAN)

akta.pro secondary industries

Community Engagement & Service-Learning Partnerships (EDALAOAI), Makerspace, Innovation Lab & Fab Lab Operations (Tools, Safety, Programming) (EDAEAGAI)

Keywords

• Collective intelligence research
• Peer-to-peer idea incubation
• Systems innovation network
• Community knowledge sharing
• Social innovation methodologies

Headquarters

HQ city

Zürich

HQ country

Switzerland

HQ region

Europe

Offices2 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations

Revenue model

1. Nonprofit Operations: CICOLAB operates as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Revenue generation mechanisms are not explicitly disclosed on their public-facing website. The organization appears to rely on volunteer contributions and member engagement rather than commercial revenue streams.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels8 records

Core offering

CICOLAB is a peer-to-peer idea incubator (or "change tank") that runs weekly moderated roundtable discussions and maintains a public knowledge repository to help systems innovators develop radically innovative ideas into functioning initiatives. Its deliverable is community facilitation services — moderated conversations, knowledge documentation, and peer networking — packaged with conceptual frameworks (Wisdom Stack, Deep Profiles, Quest Template) rather than a software product. The organization operates free of charge as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and reaches participants globally via virtual channels.

Product overview

CICOLAB is a virtual peer-to-peer idea incubator and change tank that operates as a collective intelligence platform. The core platform centers on weekly moderated roundtable discussions, with complementary sub-products and tools including the Wisdom Stack framework for organizing collective intelligence concepts, Deep Profiles for documenting idea evolution, the Knowledge Repository for storing and accessing session materials (recordings, transcripts, notes), the Quest Template for documenting experiments and learnings, LearninGarden as an educational spin-off for children and families, and Brave Space as a cultural methodology. These components work together to enable collective wisdom cultivation, rapid learning networks, and the transition of innovative ideas from concept to functioning initiatives.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• LearninGarden: An alternative to popularly known 'learning pods' where kids and their parents/grandparents/guardians can gather and co-learn about collaboration, art and design, critical thought and systems thinking. Also referred to as Kids KooLaboratory.

Products and services

• CICOLAB Collaboratory (Community Platform) A virtual peer-to-peer idea incubator and "change tank" for systems innovators that uses collective intelligence methodologies to help cross-disciplinary changemakers develop radically innovative ideas into functioning ventures. Open to participants globally at no cost.
• Weekly Roundtable Discussions Weekly curated and moderated roundtable conversations featuring multifaceted participants from academia, activism, storytelling, healing, art, teaching, technology, and business innovation. Sessions are recorded, transcribed, and published into the knowledge repository.
• Public Knowledge Repository An accessible public repository of weekly session recordings, transcripts (audio and chat), notes, Coggle mind maps, and short video wraps that enables newcomers to trace how collective hypotheses have formed over time.
• LearninGarden (Kids KooLaboratory) An educational spin-off from CICOLAB where children and parents/grandparents/guardians gather to co-learn about collaboration, art and design, critical thought, and systems thinking.

Segments1 record

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability5 records

Feature6 records

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Broad incumbents

• Nesta: Nesta is a UK innovation foundation funding and researching new approaches to social and systems-level challenges — analogous to CICOLAB's systems-innovation orientation but operating as a large, established grant-making institution.
• Impact Hub: Impact Hub is a global network of impact-focused community spaces and incubators — overlapping with CICOLAB's mission of supporting changemakers and systems innovators but operating physical hubs at much greater scale.
• Mozilla Foundation: Mozilla Foundation supports an open, healthy internet through fellowships, grants, and community programs — closely tied to CICOLAB since founder Lauren Nignon is a Mozilla Open Leader, sharing values of open knowledge, community leadership, and responsible technology development.
• Purpose: Purpose is a movement-builder agency that designs campaigns and organizations for social impact, sharing CICOLAB's focus on paradigm-shift changemaking but operating as a commercial strategy and creative agency.

Emerging players

• OuiShare: OuiShare is a global network and movement connecting collaborators around the sharing economy and collaborative paradigms, mirroring CICOLAB's emphasis on cross-disciplinary peer collaboration for systemic change.

Direct peers

• Open Collective: Open Collective is a transparent funding and governance platform for grassroots communities and open source projects — comparable to CICOLAB as a community-driven, nonprofit-oriented collective operating with radical transparency.
• Enspiral: Enspiral is a network of social entrepreneurs and impact practitioners collaborating through distributed, peer-to-peer methodologies — closely analogous to CICOLAB's collective intelligence and self-organizing community model for changemakers.
• Loomio: Loomio is a cooperative decision-making platform built for groups and collectives, sharing CICOLAB's emphasis on peer governance, collaborative norms, and structured group sensemaking — though more software-tool oriented.
• Sensorica: Sensorica is an open value network that coordinates distributed contributors around shared innovation projects, conceptually similar to CICOLAB's peer-to-peer idea incubator and radical-innovation incubation model.

Regional players

• re:publica: re:publica is Europe's leading conference and community on digital culture and internet society, comparable to CICOLAB as a community-driven knowledge-sharing forum for digital and social innovators — primarily Europe-focused with annual in-person events.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/channel/UC22gy5an-WWrjo0pc5Qbavw/playlists
• Facebookfacebook.com/collectiveintelligencecollaboratory
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/in/laurennignon
• Pinterestpinterest.com/collectiveintelligencecolab/cicolab-collective-intelligence-quotes
• Xx.com/cicollaboratory

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles3 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Collective Intelligence Collaboratory