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Aravind Srinivas: The AI Visionary Reshaping Search Technology
When Aravind Srinivas was pursuing his PhD at UC Berkeley in 2022, he encountered a problem that would ultimately reshape how millions of people search for information online. Exactly what this startup would do, however, was a bit unclear. Today, Srinivas stands as the CEO and co-founder of Perplexity AI, a company that has fundamentally challenged Google’s dominance in search and achieved a staggering $14 billion valuation in just three years. His journey from a young electrical engineering student in Chennai to one of the most influential leaders in artificial intelligence demonstrates the transformative power of persistence, innovation, and timing in the rapidly evolving AI landscape.
From Chennai to Silicon Valley: The Making of an AI Pioneer
Srinivas was born on June 7, 1994 in Madras, India, known now as Chennai. Growing up in the same city as current Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Srinivas idolized the tech leader who would later become his competitor. During his summer internship at Google DeepMind’s London headquarters, Srinivas’s rental accommodation was so shabby that he spent many nights sleeping at the office. It was during those late nights that he discovered “In the Plex,” Steven Levy’s chronicle of Google’s first 15 years, which changed his entire perspective on startups and entrepreneurship.
He earned dual degrees (B.Tech and M.Tech) in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras. Despite initially failing to switch majors to computer science, his background in electrical engineering provided a strong foundation in the essential concepts for machine learning. At IIT Madras, Srinivas was fortunate to study under professors who were pioneering AI research at a time when the field was still nascent. During his time at IIT Madras, Aravind published in top tier AI conferences like International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR), AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence, and NeurIPS.
He later pursued a PhD in computer science at the University of California, Berkeley. During his academic career, he held prestigious research positions at OpenAI, Google Brain, and DeepMind, focusing on machine learning and artificial intelligence. These experiences at the world’s leading AI labs would prove instrumental in shaping his vision for conversational search technology.
Revolutionary Achievements in AI Search
In 2022, he co-founded Perplexity AI alongside Denis Yarats, Johnny Ho, and Andy Konwinski. The company developed what it calls “the world’s first generally available conversational answer engine that directly answers questions about any topic.” Unlike traditional search engines that present users with a list of links, Perplexity provides direct, conversational responses with source citations, fundamentally changing how people interact with information online.
The growth trajectory has been nothing short of extraordinary. Perplexity received 780 million queries in May, CEO Aravind Srinivas shared onstage at Bloomberg’s Tech Summit on Thursday. From processing just 3,000 queries on their first day in 2022, the company now handles approximately 30 million queries daily, representing phenomenal growth that has captured the attention of both users and investors worldwide.
Under Srinivas’s leadership, Perplexity has achieved multiple funding milestones that reflect investor confidence in the AI sector. The company has raised another $62.7 million in its fourth round of funding, at a $1.04 billion valuation. This unicorn status was achieved in just over a year of operation. Its valuation in December was $9 billion, triple its $3 billion valuation in June 2024. The company’s remarkable valuation journey continued with recent reports suggesting Perplexity AI, the AI-powered search engine startup founded by Aravind Srinivas, Andy Konwinski, Denis Yarats, and Johnny Ho in 2022, is reportedly in preliminary discussions to secure up to $1.5 billion in a new investment round that could value the company at $18 billion.
Pioneering the Future with Comet Browser
Srinivas’s latest innovation represents perhaps his most ambitious project yet. Perplexity on Wednesday launched its first AI-powered web browser, called Comet, marking the startup’s latest effort to challenge Google Search as the primary avenue people use to find information online. Srinivas said the reason Perplexity is developing Comet is to shift the role of AI from simply providing answers to actually completing actions on your behalf.
The Comet browser represents a paradigm shift in how users interact with the internet. Unlike traditional browsers, Comet features a sidecar AI that can interact with your content in real time—summarizing videos, pulling transcripts, and even sending snippets via Slack—all while staying connected to services like Gmail and Google Calendar. “You really need to actually have a browser and hybridize the compute on the client and the server side in the most seamless way possible,” he said. “And that calls for rethinking the whole browser.”
Srinivas envisions Comet as more than just another browser. He went on to explain that Perplexity isn’t thinking of Comet as “yet another browser,” but as a “cognitive operating system.” The browser aims to function as a comprehensive digital assistant, capable of booking hotels, making purchases, filling out forms, and managing workflows without requiring users to jump between multiple applications.
The strategic partnerships Srinivas has secured further demonstrate Perplexity’s growing influence. Perplexity has also been in talks with Samsung about a partnership that would see Perplexity’s app preloaded onto Samsung’s top-of-the-line Galaxy smartphones and perhaps integrated into Samsung’s mobile browser. These partnerships with major telecommunications companies like Deutsche Telekom and SoftBank potentially expose Perplexity to hundreds of millions of users worldwide.
Impact on the Technology Industry
The influence of Srinivas and Perplexity on the broader technology landscape cannot be overstated. Even today, three years after Perplexity’s launch, Google has not overhauled its main search landing page, google.com, to match Perplexity’s generative AI features. However, Google has been forced to adapt, introducing “AI Overviews” and an “AI Mode” that functions similarly to Perplexity’s approach.
Under Srinivas’s leadership, Perplexity AI has secured significant funding from investors including Jeff Bezos, Elad Gil, Nat Friedman, and Nvidia. The company has attracted support from some of the most respected names in technology, including former Y Combinator head Daniel Gross, OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy, and legendary investor Stanley Druckenmiller.
The broader implications of Srinivas’s work extend beyond just search technology. As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly integrated into daily life, his vision of conversational, context-aware AI systems represents a fundamental shift in human-computer interaction. “In a world where you can easily create fake content with AI, accurate answers and trustworthy sources become even more essential.”
Vision for Tomorrow
Looking ahead, Srinivas continues to push the boundaries of what’s possible with AI technology. “Give it a year, we’ll be doing, like, a billion queries a week if we can sustain this growth rate,” Srinivas said. His ambitious vision extends far beyond search, encompassing a future where AI serves as a comprehensive digital assistant that can handle complex tasks across multiple platforms and applications.
“The plan is to do develop an operating system with which you can do almost everything,” Srinivasan explained, highlighting why Perplexity is focusing on this approach. This vision positions Perplexity not just as a search competitor, but as a foundational platform for the next generation of human-computer interaction.
Lasting Legacy in Artificial Intelligence
Aravind Srinivas has established himself as one of the most influential leaders in artificial intelligence, transforming how people access and interact with information online. His journey from sleeping in Google’s offices as an intern to leading a $14 billion AI company exemplifies the rapid evolution of the technology sector and the opportunities available to visionary entrepreneurs. Through Perplexity AI and the innovative Comet browser, Srinivas continues to challenge established paradigms and shape the future of artificial intelligence, cementing his position as a true pioneer in the field.
