Aravind Srinivas

Perplexity AI CEO who offered Sundar Pichai $34.5 billion to buy Google Chrome.

He is an Indian computer scientist and entrepreneur who is the CEO and co-founder of Perplexity AI, an artificial intelligence company specializing in conversational search technologies.

Aravind Srinivas was born on June 7, 1994, in Madras (now known as Chennai), India, to a Tamil family. He earned dual degrees (B.Tech and M.Tech) in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. He later earned a PhD in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.

Srinivas has held research positions at OpenAI, Google Brain, and DeepMind during his academic career, focusing on machine learning and artificial intelligence.

In 2022, he co-founded Perplexity AI with Denis Yarats, Johnny Ho, and Andy Konwinski. The company developed an AI-powered “answer engine” designed to provide direct, quoted responses to user queries, seeking to differentiate itself from traditional search engines.

Under Srinivas’ leadership, Perplexity AI has raised significant funding from investors including Jeff Bezos, Elad Gil, Nat Friedman, and Nvidia. The company also announced a partnership with Deutsche Telekom to develop an AI-integrated smartphone, aiming to develop its AI applications into hardware.

In December 2024, Srinivas said that he had been waiting for a US green card for about three years. Elon Musk replied ‘yes’ to his tweet asking if he should get a green card, which sparked a debate about US immigration.  That same year, Time Magazine named him one of the "TIME100 Most Influential People in AI".