§ The result
Versant by Pearson leads Cognisess on all 7 criteria.
Versant by Pearson finishes 19 points clear of Cognisess inside the Assessment cohort under rubric v1.0: 49 against 30. Cognisess leads none of the 7 criteria, and Versant by Pearson is ahead on 3 of them by 20 raw points or more, Article 11 Technical Documentation among them. Article 11 Technical Documentation is the widest raw gap and the heaviest weighted swing at once (Cognisess 25, Versant by Pearson 63, 20% weight), but it accounts for only 39% of the weighted advantage Versant by Pearson holds across the 7 criteria on that side of the table.
Vendor profile
Cognisess
UK talent-analytics platform that scores candidates and employees with 50+ game-based and questionnaire assessments and weighted job-fit 'profilers', can auto-pass or auto-reject applicants against score thresholds, and runs recorded video interviews with optional DeepLearn video analytics.
Vendor profile
Versant by Pearson
Versant by Pearson is a suite of AI-scored English proficiency tests (plus spoken Spanish, French, Arabic and Dutch) that automatically score candidates' spoken and written responses on Pearson's Global Scale of English within minutes, used by employers such as contact centres and BPOs to screen applicants and benchmark staff through the ScoreKeeper dashboard.
§ The record
Cognisess and Versant by Pearson are both filed under Assessment AI. They also share 1 secondary category: Screening.
Both are in scope of NYC LL 144, Illinois HB 3773, EU AI Act, Colorado AI Act and Mobley v. Workday.
| Record | Cognisess | Versant by Pearson |
|---|---|---|
| Price tier | Mid | Mid |
| Headquarters | GB | GB |
| Founded | 2011 | 1844 |
§ What decides it
The criteria that move the gap, heaviest swing first.
20% weight · 39% of the movement so far
Article 11 Technical Documentation
Cognisess 25 · Versant by Pearson 63
7.6 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
18% weight · 60% of the movement so far
Bias Audit Transparency
Cognisess 20 · Versant by Pearson 42
4.0 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
12% weight · 68% of the movement so far
Human Oversight Design
Cognisess 42 · Versant by Pearson 56
1.7 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
8% weight · 77% of the movement so far
Customer Documentation
Cognisess 40 · Versant by Pearson 61
1.7 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
15% weight · 85% of the movement so far
Data Governance Disclosure
Cognisess 42 · Versant by Pearson 53
1.6 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
15% weight · 93% of the movement so far
FRIA Support
Cognisess 20 · Versant by Pearson 30
1.5 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
12% weight · 100% of the movement so far
Post-Market Monitoring
Cognisess 32 · Versant by Pearson 43
1.3 weighted points to Versant by Pearson
Weighted delta is the raw difference times the criterion weight, so the 7 figures above sum to -19.4 — the difference between the two totals before either is rounded. Shares are of 19.4 points of movement counted without direction. The table below rounds each side to a whole number first, so its Δ raw total reads -19 beside that -19.4.
§ Category-by-category
Raw score per criterion, with weighted delta.
Δ is Cognisess minus Versant by Pearson.
| Category | Weight | Cognisess | Versant by Pearson | Δ raw | Δ weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 25 | 63 | -38 | -7.6 |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 20 | 42 | -22 | -4.0 |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 20 | 30 | -10 | -1.5 |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 42 | 53 | -11 | -1.6 |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 42 | 56 | -14 | -1.7 |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 32 | 43 | -11 | -1.3 |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 40 | 61 | -21 | -1.7 |
| Total | 100% | 30 (F) | 49 (F) | -19 | -19.4 |
§ Evidence
Cited sources and documented absences, criterion by criterion.
An absence is a finding, not a blank: the reviewer looked for a named artefact and recorded that it is not located. Where a source sits is a fact about hosting only.
| Criterion | Weight | Cognisess | Versant by Pearson | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | ||
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 2 | 1 | — | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 5 | 0 | Sources on a separate domain | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| All criteria | 100% | 21 | 5 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 23 | 6 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
Cognisess has 26 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 21 with a source URL, 5 documented absences; Versant by Pearson has 29 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 23 with a source URL, 6 documented absences; some documentation or audit rows for Cognisess and Versant by Pearson sit on a domain separate from the vendor's own site.
Provenance
The scores above are documented by 55 evidence rows on file for these two vendors: 26 for Cognisess, across 5 distinct source domains, and 29 for Versant by Pearson, across 2 distinct source domains.
- Rubric
- v1.0
- Cognisess last reviewed
- September 25, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
- Versant by Pearson last reviewed
- September 25, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
HireAIScore scores are editorial research, not legal advice, and no vendor pays for placement, scoring or removal — see the methodology, conflicts policy and terms.
§ Where next