AI start-up Perplexity makes bold bid for Google's Chrome browser
Advertisement
Run by Aravind Srinivas, Perplexity is no stranger to headline-grabbing offers – it made a similar one for TikTok US in January, offering to merge with the popular short-video app to resolve US concerns about TikTok's Chinese ownership.
Buying Chrome would allow the start-up to tap the browser's more than 3 billion users for an edge in the AI search race as regulatory pressure threatens Google's grip on the industry.
Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The company has not offered Chrome for sale and plans to appeal a US court ruling last year that found it held an unlawful monopoly in online search. The Justice Department has sought a Chrome divestiture as part of the case's remedies.
Aravind Srinivas, CEO of Perplexity. Photo: AFP
Perplexity did not disclose on Tuesday how it planned to fund the offer. The three-year-old company has raised around US$1 billion in funding so far from investors including Nvidia and Japan's SoftBank Group. It was last valued at US$14 billion.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
RTHK
7 hours ago
- RTHK
S&P 500, Nasdaq drift to fresh records, extend rally
S&P 500, Nasdaq drift to fresh records, extend rally The S&P 500 and Nasdaq indexes hit new closing highs for the second straight day. Photo: Reuters Wall Street stocks pushed higher on Wednesday, lifting the S&P 500 and Nasdaq to fresh records as markets extended a rally following data showing US inflation remains stable. Stocks are in "full easing expectations mode," said CFRA Research's Sam Stovall, who expects two Federal Reserve interest rate cuts later this year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average led major indices, winning 1.0 percent to 44,922. The broad-based S&P 500 climbed 0.3 percent to 6,466, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index added 0.1 percent at 20,713. Stocks spent most of the day in positive territory, drifting higher after Tuesday's consumer price index report showed inflation held in July at 2.7 percent year-over-year. The report reassured markets that President Donald Trump's aggressive campaign of tariffs has not significantly boosted consumer prices. Stovall expects Thursday's wholesale inflation data to show increases, but "we think investors will overlook" the shift, he said in a note. Among individual companies, artificial intelligence infrastructure company CoreWeave slumped more than 20 percent despite reporting a more than tripling of quarterly revenue to US$1.2 billion and projecting higher than expected revenue growth. cited high interest costs due to CoreWeave's hefty debt load and said the company faces likely profitability pressures as it undertakes "aggressive capacity expansion to meet surging AI-driven demand." Brinker International rose 1.6 percent as it reported profit and revenue growth behind higher sales at its Chili's restaurant chain. (AFP)
South China Morning Post
12 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
From friends to foes: what's behind Trump's Brazil-India wrath
As eight Brazilian senators settled into their seats on a flight to Washington on a dry winter evening last month, a single question overshadowed the deep political differences that separated some of them: could they stop the Americans from imposing a tariff that threatened to gut their country's vital export revenues? They had begun to feel a sense of urgency weeks earlier, forcing them to put aside a stand-off between President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and former president Jair Bolsonaro that has reverberated beyond the country's borders. In early July, US President Donald Trump raised duties on Brazilian goods to 50 per cent, up from the 10 per cent imposed in April. He spoke of national security, but in Brasilia, many read the move as payback for what Trump claimed was Brazil's meddling in the fate of Bolsonaro, an ally of the US leader, who was accused of attempting a coup in 2021. A day later, the delegation – a cross-party group that included Bolsonaro's former agriculture minister Tereza Cristina, Lula's Senate leader Jacques Wagner, and Marcos Pontes, a senator from the former president's political bloc – landed in the US capital. The answer came swiftly. The White House refused to meet them. Republican US senators loyal to Trump kept their distance. Only Thom Tillis, a rare Republican Trump critic, with little sway over trade policy – and soon to retire – agreed to talk. Most of their time was spent with Democrats, who were cordial and sympathetic but powerless to change the Trump administration's course. By late summer, the tariff no longer looked like an isolated trade fight. India, long seen by Washington as a key democratic counterweight to China's influence in the strategic Indo-Pacific region, faced similar levies, additional penalties and sharp public rebukes.
South China Morning Post
20 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
Tencent's 2nd-quarter sales, profit top forecasts as AI gives China's tech giant a leg up
Tencent Holdings' second-quarter earnings beat analysts' forecasts, as revenue from artificial intelligence (AI) boosted the bottom line of the world's largest games publisher and China's dominant super app operator. Net profit rose 16 per cent to 56 billion yuan (US$7.81 billion) in the three months that ended in June, according to global accounting standards. Sales increased for the 11th quarter, jumping 15 per cent to 184.5 billion yuan and beating the consensus estimate of 19 analysts in a Bloomberg survey. The Shenzhen-based company, one of China's largest technology behemoths, was able to grow its sales and profitability because 'we invested in, and also benefited from, utilising AI', Tencent said in its earnings press release on Wednesday. Shares of the company increased 4.7 per cent amid a rising market in Hong Kong to close at HK$586 before Tencent's results were announced. The stock has gained 40.5 per cent this year. Tencent Holdings unveiled an open-source AI model on July 27, capable of generating detailed 3D environment. Photo: handout The company said that its revenues from 'marketing services' increased 20 per cent to 35.8 billion yuan for the second quarter 'primarily due to AI-driven improvements to our advertising platform and enhancements to the Weixin transaction ecosystem.'
