If all your entities are in the US and the work eating your team's time is filing and paying, automated filing is the better fit. If you hold entities abroad, or you want a named person answering for every filing, a service bureau is. Cogency Global, in the registered agent business since 1980, is a service bureau: its teams do the filing, and a portal shows you where each entity stands.
The stakes are higher than the work looks. The Association of Corporate Counsel and Deloitte surveyed 467 organizations for a 2023 ACC/Deloitte report on legal entity management. Among respondents in finance and banking, 40% had fallen out of good standing with a regulator in the previous two years. For a fund, good standing is the first thing a lender or an acquirer checks.
Cogency Global files with people; Discern files with software
Cogency assigns the filing work to a service team. Discern assigns it to software. Both cover the same obligations, including registered agent representation, annual and biennial report deadlines, foreign qualifications, and Delaware's annual tax, so the question is not what gets filed. It is who files it, and who holds a missed deadline.
Cogency Global: a service team files, Entity Central tracks
A Cogency service team does the filing, and Entity Central, its entity management system, keeps track of what is due. The pitch is accountability by a named person: its registered agent materials promise "timely responses from a dedicated, experienced person. Every time." Entity Central comes at no additional cost and covers:
Compliance calendar for annual report and franchise tax due dates
Automatic notifications for entity status changes and service of process
Virtual minute book for governance records
On-demand report generation
Cogency also runs offices in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore, and its March 2026 Elemental CoSec acquisition added a Chambers Band 1-rated UK company secretarial and governance firm.
Discern: the software files, your team reviews
Discern's software prepares and submits the filings, and your team reviews what it flagged. It describes itself as "a software-first registered agent that automates state filings," a self-description in the Business Wire release announcing its $10 million Series A on July 29, 2026 and its 800-plus client count. Discern's automated filing capabilities document:
Registered agent coverage in all 51 US jurisdictions, for corporations, LLCs, LPs, LLPs, PCs, PAs, PLLCs, and not-for-profits
Annual reports filed automatically from pre-filled forms ahead of due dates
An audit of every entity at onboarding, so old delinquencies get fixed rather than inherited
Discern documents no international coverage, so a portfolio holding UK or Asian entities needs a second provider. Discern's security and compliance page reports SOC 2 Type II certification with annual third-party audits.
Cogency Global vs Discern: same coverage, one published price
US coverage is a tie, because each provider reports registered agent service across all US jurisdictions. The first practical difference is that Discern publishes its rates and Cogency prices by quote.
What you are comparing | Cogency Global | Discern |
|---|---|---|
Who does the filing | A service team; Entity Central tracks | The software; your team reviews |
Registered agent coverage | All US jurisdictions, plus international offices | All 51 US jurisdictions, all entity types |
Annual and biennial reports | Filed by a service team, with deadline tracking | Filed automatically from pre-filled forms before the due date |
Delaware annual tax | Due date tracked in the compliance calendar | Calculated, filed, and paid inside the subscription |
Franchise tax in other states | Due date tracked in the compliance calendar | Alerting included in the subscription |
Foreign qualification | Formation and qualification services | Filed digitally, with the certificate of good standing pulled automatically |
Paying from separate accounts | Not described in published materials | Any number of payment methods mapped to any number of entities |
Entity records | Entity Central, included at no additional cost | Custom labels, entity groups, general partner chain tracking |
Entities outside the US | London, Hong Kong, and Singapore offices; UK company secretarial via Elemental CoSec | Not documented |
Published pricing | None; quote required | $350 per state registration, per year |
One-time filing fees | None published | $99 + state fees for formations and foreign registrations; $249 + state fees for PLLCs, PCs, and PAs; change of agent free |
A cell reading "not described" means that provider's published materials do not address it, not that the capability is absent. Each column has one.
You can price Discern before you speak to anyone. A 100-entity structure registered in three states each is 300 registrations, or $105,000 a year at $350 each. Discern's published pricing page confirms that figure includes registered agent service, annual report filing, standing monitoring, franchise tax alerting, unlimited users, automated payments, and Delaware annual tax filing.
You cannot price Cogency the same way, because it publishes no per-entity rates. The same portfolio starts with a sales call. If your budget closes before that call can be scheduled, only one of the two can go into it.
The two differences that decide it: Delaware taxes and payments
Two things decide it in practice: how each provider handles Delaware's annual tax, and whether it can pay filings from separate bank accounts. Both come back to one point. A calendar tells you when something is due; it does not do it.
Delaware's annual tax: Cogency tracks the deadline, Discern pays it
Cogency's compliance calendar tells you when Delaware's annual tax is due. Discern calculates it, files it, and pays it inside the $350 subscription. The gap matters because the payment is small and the penalty for missing it is not.
Delaware LLCs and LPs file no annual report but owe a flat annual tax, generally due June 1; confirm the date against Delaware's current instructions each year. Two figures are in circulation. The statutory amount is $400, set by 6 Del. C. § 18-1107(b) in the Delaware LLC Act and § 17-1109(a) in the Delaware LP Act, raised from $300 by HB 400, signed May 21, 2026 and effective January 1, 2026. Delaware's own franchise tax page still listed $300 in August 2026. An LP, a GP LLC, and a management company owe three of those payments on one date: $900 at the published figure, $1,200 at the statutory one.
Miss one and the amount stops mattering. A late payment adds a $200 penalty plus 1.5% monthly interest (§ 18-1107(c) and (e); § 17-1109(d) for LPs), and the entity ceases to be in good standing under § 18-1107(h). The state then stops accepting its filings, withholds certificates of good standing, and bars it from Delaware courts until it is restored (§ 18-1107(k) and (l)). After three years unpaid, § 18-1108(a) cancels the LLC's certificate of formation, and § 17-1110(a) an LP's.
Losing that certificate reaches your deal calendar. California's business entity FAQs require a current certificate of good standing from foreign LLCs and LPs, and Florida's foreign LLC instructions want a certificate of existence issued within 90 days. A lapsed Delaware entity can produce neither, so registering in a new state stops until the delinquency is cleared. In the same survey, 9% of respondents said a delinquency had affected a business transaction or strategic initiative, including delaying an M&A deal. A $400 payment can hold up a state registration, so who makes it matters more than what it costs.
Paying from separate accounts: only Discern documents how
Discern documents mapping payment methods to individual entities. Cogency's published materials do not. That matters because fund structures multiply bank accounts faster than they multiply entities.
Citi Private Bank's family office guide warns family offices about entity proliferation on this exact ground: entities with their own accounts can leave several hundred bank accounts to reconcile periodically. Citi is cautioning about entity count, not billing, but the consequence follows. A provider that bills everything to one account leaves your finance team splitting each charge by hand, hundreds of times a year at 300 registrations.
Discern's enterprise payments and invoicing covers the alternative: any number of payment methods mapped to any number of entities, with payments automated and filing costs forecast for this year and next. Discern reports this running across 250+ entities and 150+ bank accounts and removing 400+ annual invoices. Your controller notices that difference before anyone else.
Pick Cogency Global for non-US entities, Discern for US filing volume
Both beat the spreadsheet most teams are still running. In the same survey, 38% of organizations used Excel exclusively for entity management and just 30% of those were satisfied, against 67% of the organizations on a formal platform. So the narrower question is which failure mode would cost you more: a filing nobody started, or a filing nobody read?
When Cogency Global fits
You hold entities outside the United States, where Cogency's overseas offices and Elemental CoSec give it UK company secretarial capability Discern does not document
You want a named person answering for each filing rather than a list of items the software flagged
You need work beyond Secretary of State compliance: lender, process agent, and nonprofit services
Your entity count is low enough that invoice volume and per-entity payments are not your problem
When Discern fits
Your portfolio is US-only and runs from 50 to 250+ entities, which describes most PE firms, hedge funds, and family offices
Filing volume is the bottleneck, and you want reports filed ahead of the due date without anyone starting them
You run segregated fund structures, where paying each entity from its own account removes a manual reconciliation
Your LP, GP, and management company entities sit in Delaware, and you want the annual tax paid rather than tracked
Neither model is wrong for the portfolio it was built for. The expensive mistake is buying the one built for the other.
Automate your Secretary of State filings with Discern
If your entities are all in the US, Discern is the fit, and Cogency's overseas offices are the one reason to decide otherwise. Discern covers the whole Secretary of State layer from a single platform. That means registered agent service in all 51 US jurisdictions, annual reports filed before their due dates, foreign qualifications with certificates pulled automatically, and Delaware annual tax paid.
The saving grows with your entity count. Customers with 200+ state registrations report spending 5 to 10 minutes a year on compliance, and annual report compliance for private equity firms stops depending on whoever remembers the calendar. The outcome is simple: no entity of yours drops out of good standing, so nothing surfaces mid-transaction for a lender or an acquirer.
Book a demo with Discern to see what your portfolio looks like on automated filing.
This article provides general compliance information and does not constitute legal advice. Consult qualified legal counsel for guidance specific to your situation.
Frequently asked questions
These are the questions that come up most often when teams put the two providers side by side.
Who is Cogency Global, and who owns it?
Cogency Global is a New York based registered agent and compliance services company founded in 1980. Private equity firm Bertram Capital has owned it since February 2022, per the Bertram acquisition announcement. It provides registered agent representation across US jurisdictions, entity management through Entity Central, and international corporate services from offices in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
Can you move entities from one provider to the other mid-year?
Yes. A change of registered agent is a state filing, so it can be made at any point in the year rather than at a renewal date. On Discern, change of agent filings are free, with state filing fees passed through at cost. Expect the incoming provider to want a current entity list, formation dates, and jurisdictions before it starts.
Does either provider handle entities outside the United States?
Cogency does; Discern does not document international coverage. Cogency operates offices in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore and added UK company secretarial and governance capability through Elemental CoSec. A portfolio holding non-US entities either consolidates with Cogency or runs a second provider offshore.
What happens to entities that are already out of good standing?
They have to be brought back into good standing before they can file anything else. Reinstatement is state-specific and generally involves back taxes or reports plus a penalty, so treat it as a question for your counsel rather than a filing task. Discern audits every entity at onboarding and identifies old compliance problems before they carry forward, and on the Cogency side, Entity Central surfaces status changes through automatic notifications.
Which provider handles Delaware franchise tax without your team?
Discern calculates, files, and pays the Delaware annual tax inside its $350 subscription. Cogency's compliance calendar tracks franchise tax due dates and notifies you, with the filing itself running through its service teams. If your Delaware LP and GP entities are the ones that keep you up, that is the distinction to test in a demo.
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