Perplexity AI’s $34.5B Bid to Buy Chrome Just Might Be a Stunt

The AI search engine company Perplexity just made a headline-grabbing offer to buy Google Chrome for $34.5 billion.

The unsolicited all-cash offer is significantly higher than Perplexity’s current estimated $18 billion valuation. It’s also higher than the $20 billion valuation that Perplexity will value itself at for its next round of funding.

Here’s why experts are calling the offer a marketing stunt.

Perplexity’s $34.5 Billion Dream

Perplexity, a three-year-old company known for a AI-powered web search engine software that turns user queries into custom-synthesized responses, has itself raised around $1 billion in funding, with investors including Nvidia and SoftBank.

The offer was revealed on Tuesday. The company has stated that multiple funds have offered to fully finance the deal, although the funds have not been named.

The deal amount was likely calculated based off of paying $10 for each user, given that Perplexity AI’s own engine recently gave 3.45 billion as Chrome’s total number of users.

Investor M. G. Siegler writes that the whole offer is a “transparently silly marketing stunt,” and he’s not the only one saying as much.

3 Reasons Why It’s a Stunt

One reason why pundits are calling this offer a go-nowhere stunt? Because Perplexity has made a similar move in the past. In January, it publically offered to merge with TikTok US when the popular social platform was making headlines due to US concerns about its Chinese owners.

However, there’s another, more relevant reason: It’s just too much money. Companies don’t really buy other companies that are worth the same amount as they are, let alone billions more.

There’s one last reason, too. This gives Perplexity the chance to bring a little more attention to the fact that Chrome could potentially be bought at all, which may help throw a little shade on Perplexity’s biggest rival in the search engine game, Google.

Google’s Antitrust Troubles

In 2024, a US court ruling found Google held an unlawful monopoly in online search. For that case’s remedies, the Justice Department sought a Chrome divestiture.

Perplexity is joining a small handful of other enties that have shown interest in buying Chrome: OpenAI, Yahoo, and private-equity firm Apollo Global Management are also on the list, notes Reuters.

For its part, Google plans to appeal the court ruling, and is unlikely to willingly part with Chrome, a bedrock platform for the tech giant and a key element in its own push towards AI tech.