Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas believes the web browser is the most effective platform for building the next generation of artificial intelligence assistants. In a recent interview with Alex Heath for The Verge’s “Decoder” podcast, Srinivas explained that his company is betting on the browser as the key to creating AI “agents” that can perform complex tasks for users.
Perplexity has launched an invite-only beta for its new AI-powered browser, Comet, on Mac and Windows. According to Srinivas, the browser is the perfect environment for an AI agent because it already contains a user’s context, such as logins to third-party applications. This allows an agent to securely access and act on information on the user’s behalf, all on the local device. “You want this one interface that the agent and the human can both operate in the same manner,” Srinivas said, highlighting that users can easily supervise the AI and take over if it fails.
Comet is built on Chromium, the open-source foundation of Google Chrome. This decision was made to provide users with a familiar interface and to allow for a one-click import of their data, settings, and extensions from Chrome. The browser’s main feature is a “sidecar,” an AI assistant that appears alongside webpages. It can answer questions about the page’s content, summarize videos, or perform actions across different sites, such as scheduling calendar events.
While early use cases include managing emails and creating social media posts, Srinivas acknowledged that Comet is not yet perfect. He described the product as sometimes “brittle” and not yet capable of handling long, multi-step tasks reliably. However, he expressed confidence that advances in AI reasoning models would enable these capabilities within a year.
Srinivas also discussed the business model for the computationally expensive browser. He envisions a future where users might pay for specific, high-value tasks on a usage basis. For a complex task that saves a business hours of work, a single prompt could be worth thousands of dollars, he argued.
Looking ahead, Srinivas sees the browser as a bigger opportunity than the chatbot market, which he considers largely settled. He stated that Perplexity’s expertise in search is a key advantage, as a powerful search function is essential for a useful AI browser. The company’s long-term goal is to become profitable and pursue an initial public offering around 2028, aiming to establish Comet as an indispensable tool that makes users’ lives easier.
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