Trisha Kothari co-founded Unit21, the company that gives banks and fintechs tools to detect and investigate fraud and money laundering, and led it as chief executive until April 2026. She is now Chairman of the Board, focused on long-term strategy.
From India to Affirm
She grew up in India and studied computer science at the University of Pennsylvania. Her first big job in fintech was at Affirm, the buy now, pay later lender, where she worked as an early engineer and product manager.
Before starting a company, she and co-founder Clarence Chio set three tests: it had to be a technical product, it had to be a real business, and it had to have human impact. Software that stops real-world crime met all three.
Learning From Rejection
Unit21 began in 2018, and the first sales were hard. Risk and compliance buyers are cautious for good reason: a failed system can cost someone their job or bring regulators to the door. She has said the lesson was to listen to the quality of a rejection. Prospects were not saying the problem was unimportant; they were saying they did not want to be first.
The breakthrough came with Coinbase, which let Unit21 take over one part of its investigations that was still run in Google Sheets. Intuit followed as the second customer, and those early wins helped the company sign the next ones.
Building the Data Layer
Under her leadership Unit21 grew into a platform used by more than 200 customers in 90 countries, raising close to $100 million along the way. She has spoken about the fragmented identity layer in fintech, where companies stitch together many verification vendors, and about the value of a shared data consortium that pools information on known fraudsters across institutions.
In April 2026 she handed the CEO role to Tyler Allen, the company’s first hire, and moved to Chairman. The company she started to replace spreadsheets in risk teams is now betting on AI agents, and she stays on as Chairman, responsible for its long-term strategy.
