Perplexity AI has made a US$34.5 billion all-cash offer to acquire Google’s Chrome browser, a move that would provide the AI startup with access to billions of users and a significant advantage in the AI search race. The offer, which is well above Perplexity’s own valuation, comes at a time when regulatory pressure threatens Google’s dominance in the search market.
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Google has not offered Chrome for sale and is appealing a court ruling from last year that found it had an unlawful monopoly in online search. The U.S. Department of Justice has previously sought a Chrome divestiture as a remedy in the case.
Perplexity, a three-year-old company with around $1 billion in funding from investors like Nvidia and SoftBank, did not disclose how it would finance the deal. However, the company stated that multiple funds have offered to provide full financing. If the acquisition were to succeed, it would allow Perplexity to integrate its AI browser, Comet, with Chrome’s more than three billion users, giving it the scale to compete with rivals like OpenAI, which is also developing its own AI browser.
The bid pledges to keep the Chromium code open source, invest $3 billion over two years, and make no changes to Chrome’s default search engine.
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Analysts believe Google is highly unlikely to sell Chrome, as the browser is a crucial component of its AI strategy. Google is currently rolling out AI-generated search summaries, known as Overviews, to defend its search market share.
A federal judge is expected to issue a ruling on remedies in the Google antitrust case this month. However, legal experts suggest that any forced sale would likely be tied up in a lengthy appeals process, potentially lasting for several years. The offer from Perplexity is also below the at-least-$50-billion valuation that DuckDuckGo’s CEO, Gabriel Weinberg, has suggested Chrome might command if Google were forced to sell it.
