AI upstart Perplexity is making waves with a bold $34.5 billion bid for Google's Chrome browser, aiming to elbow into the search market currently dominated by the tech titan. The San Francisco-based company, valued at $18 billion, claims it has full investor backing for the offer, per the Wall Street Journal. Just months ago, it had been valued at $14 billion, reports MSNBC. Recent estimates of Chrome's value, meanwhile, have bounced between $20 billion and $50 billion.
The timing isn't accidental. US District Judge Amit Mehta is mulling whether Google should be forced to part with Chrome as a fix for what he's called illegal monopolization of web search. Perplexity's pitch, delivered in a letter to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, is framed as an antitrust solution in the "highest public interest," in which it vows to run Chrome as an independent entity and keep it open for all, with Google's search engine as the default initially. Google, unsurprisingly, isn't eager to let go of its browser, which commands more than 60% of the worldwide browser market and serves 3.5 billion users.
Pichai has argued that a forced sale would hobble Google's innovation, risk user security, and disrupt business. Meanwhile, Perplexity, which also tried to scoop up TikTok earlier this year, is trying to show it's ready for the big leagues, having just launched its own browser, Comet, and pledging to maintain Chromium, the open-source backbone of Chrome. The antitrust trial, launched by the Justice Department in 2020, has also floated milder remedies, like curbing Google's ability to pay its way into being the default search engine. Other companies that have signaled interest in buying Chrome include OpenAI, Yahoo, and private equity firm Apollo Global Management, per Reuters.
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