Podcast Summary

Podcast: The Mark Cuban Podcast
Episode: What’s Behind Perplexity Bids To Buy Google!: Why this shocking move could change everything
Date: August 22, 2025
Host: Mark Cuban (A)

Episode Overview

In this episode, Mark Cuban explores Perplexity AI’s bold and surprising $34.5 billion cash offer to acquire Google Chrome. The discussion unpacks the implications of this move against the backdrop of ongoing antitrust concerns facing Google. Cuban analyzes whether Perplexity’s bid is a serious acquisition attempt or a high-profile marketing ploy, delves into the details of the bid, the players involved, and considers what the future could hold for Google Chrome, Perplexity, and the tech industry at large.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Offer: Perplexity's Bid for Google Chrome

Unsolicited $34.5 Billion Offer:
- Perplexity, the AI search engine competitor, has made a cash offer to buy Google Chrome (“This is definitely a huge move. They offered $34.5 billion in cash.” – 03:31).
- The offer was unsolicited; Google did not put Chrome up for sale.
Context:
- Triggered by antitrust speculation: U.S. DOJ and a judge have ruled that Google’s practices around Chrome were anti-competitive, creating expectations that Chrome could be spun out.

2. Potential Motives and Strategic Value

Perplexity’s Search Ambitions:
- Buying Chrome would dramatically expand Perplexity’s reach and user base.
- Perplexity has its own AI-first browser, Comment ($200/month, agent-driven), which could be integrated with Chrome.
- “You can imagine the technology of Comment coming into Chrome… would make this kind of a no brainer for Perplexity.” (05:43)

3. Unusual Terms and Concessions

Open Source Commitment:
- Perplexity promises to keep Chromium (Chrome’s underlying engine) open source.
- Commits to invest an additional $3 billion into Chromium if the deal goes through. (“They also included in their offer a promise to invest $3 billion into the open source project.” – 07:34)
User & Default Settings:
- Perplexity pledges not to change default browsers or settings, and not to automatically set their AI-powered option as default.
Transparency:
- Public and media skepticism about the seriousness of Perplexity’s bid, in light of their own fundraising (“Perplexity to date has only raised $1.5 billion for their company… and they’re offering an all cash deal of 34 billion.” – 13:17)

4. Google's Predicament

Google’s Response and DOJ Action:
- Google has declined to comment and is appealing the antitrust ruling.
- DOJ had previously proposed spinning out Chrome and requiring divestment over monopolistic practices.
- Google is fighting related battles over ad tech as well (“The DOJ is proposing that Google be forced to divest two of its biggest products as ad tech products or it’s going to break up its ad business.” – 11:40)
Market Value Debate:
- DuckDuckGo testified Chrome could be worth $50+ billion, making Perplexity’s bid look low (“If perplexity was actually able to get Chrome for 34 billion, that would be a massive discount.” – 12:17)

5. Industry Implications

Potential Bidders:
- Speculation about who could realistically acquire Chrome (Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, or another big tech firm).
- Concerns about simply swapping ownership from one giant to another: “Why would we just take one massive… software from one massive company, pass it to another massive company? I don’t know what problems we’re really solving there…” (15:20)
Marketing Stunt or a Serious Play?:
- Skepticism given Perplexity’s size and capital compared to the required bid.
- CEO claims backing from investors.
Global Competition:
- If forced to sell, Chrome would provoke a global bidding war due to its 68% browser market share.

6. Other Noteworthy Moves by Perplexity

TikTok Merger Bid:
- Perplexity has also submitted a bid to merge with TikTok amid renewed US government scrutiny (“Apparently, they’ve submitted a bid to merge with TikTok… It could be some absolutely insane moves of one company benefiting a lot from some of the legal landscape in the United States right now.” – 16:54)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On the shock value of the bid:
“This is an absolutely insane offer for many different reasons.” (00:02)
On the strategic fit for Perplexity:
“Perplexity is basically a search engine competitor to Google. So buying something like Chrome would obviously give them more reach for their Perplexity search engine.” (04:33)
On market skepticism:
“Perplexity to date has only raised $1.5 billion... their valuation is only $18 billion. So they’re trying to acquire a quote, unquote, $34 billion company.” (13:17)
On the open-source value of Chromium:
“The most valuable is all of the plugins that have been built onto Google Chrome… You get access to all of those plugins if you use Google Chrome.” (06:46)
On antitrust and future ownership:
“I don’t know if Google’s going to be able to keep, keep it all together. I don’t like the thought of… breaking up a company. But at the same time, Google is massive… and if they’re being anti-competitive, it would be a big shake up.” (11:24)

Timestamps for Key Segments

[00:00] Introduction to Perplexity’s $34.5B Chrome bid and antitrust backdrop
[03:31] The terms of Perplexity’s offer; open source and investment concessions
[06:46] Why Chromium’s open source framework is so valuable
[09:00] The legal context: DOJ moves, anticompetitive ruling
[11:24] Broader antitrust actions against Google; implications for ad tech and Chrome
[12:17] Market valuation debate: DuckDuckGo’s $50B estimation
[13:17] The math behind Perplexity’s offer vs. their own valuation and funding
[15:20] Big tech players as possible acquirers; doubts on solving root problems
[16:54] Perplexity’s simultaneous bid for TikTok and industry implications

Summary

This episode offers a deep, candid look at the dramatic bid by Perplexity AI to acquire Google Chrome, prompted by the heat of US antitrust action. Mark Cuban breaks down the unusual economics, the strategic motivations, the perceived marketing element, and the broader ramifications for the tech landscape. With candid skepticism and clear explanation, Cuban underscores both the wild ambition and probable improbability of the deal, while flagging that the real story may be only beginning—with implications for Google, Perplexity, and the power balance of the web browser world.

For listeners interested in tech mergers, antitrust dynamics, and the strategies disrupting big tech, this episode delivers accessible yet insightful analysis throughout.

Transcript

A (0:00)

Perplexity, the AI startup, has just offered over $30 billion to buy Google Chrome. Now this is an absolutely insane offer for many different reasons. They made a bunch of concessions and said that they'll follow a bunch of basically guidelines if they were to go through with this purchase. Where did this come from? Is Google selling Google Chrome? Why is this offer happening? Is this realistic? We're going to get into all of that on the podcast today. And I think this is really interesting because this is not the first time that Perplexity has made one of these really kind of high profile, big tech acquisition offers that some people have raised their eyebrows at. So this is kind of a, this is going to be an interesting one. Before we get into all of that, I wanted to mention if you've ever wanted to try all of the different AI models that I talk about on the podcast, I'd love for you to check out my own platform, which is called AI Box AI. Essentially you get access to the top 40 different AI models all in one platform, that you're able to upload documents, talk to all of your, all of your different AI models in the same chat, and it's $20 a month. So instead of paying $20 for a subscription to every single model, one subscription, and you get access to everything, it's consolidated. At one point you have to go track down what conversation you're having with which model. There's a whole bunch of AI image and audio models on there, so go check it out. AI Box AI. I'll leave a link in the description. All right, let's talk about what's going on with Perplexity. So this is definitely a huge move. They offered $34.5 billion in cash. This was an unsolicited offer, to be fair. So Google didn't say, hey, who wants to buy us? Basically they just said, hey, you know, well, we're going to acquire you if you want. What's happened recently is that Google has gotten themselves into a bit of an antitrust issue. And a judge ruled that Google Chrome and some of the behavior that they had around Google Chrome was anti competitive. And a lot of people are speculating that they're going to be forced to spin this out of Google. Now the judge hasn't actually ruled that this is the, you know, the verdict and what they actually have to do, but this is just a lot of speculation. And so at this time, Perplexity comes out, puts out this big huge bid. Now a lot of people are basically calling this a marketing stunt. Some people think that they're serious about it. And there's a couple interesting things. Number one, that the value is absolutely insane. But it also makes a lot of sense. Perplexity is basically a search engine competitor to Google. So buying something like Chrome would obviously give them more reach for their Perplexity search engine. And at the same time Perplexity has actually just put out their very own browser that competes with Chrome called Comment. This is something you gotta pay $200 a month for. It's AI first. It's kind of like an agent where you can talk to it and go do tasks for you. But you can imagine the technology of Comment coming into Chrome along with being able to put Perplexity a little bit more front and center with Chrome would make this kind of a no brainer for Perplexity. Now is this a no brainer for Google? Is this something that's actually going to happen? Not everyone is convinced of that. One thing that Perplexity has said is that the, you know, the terms of their offer include basically a commitment to keep Chrome's underlying engine, which is called Chromium, open source. Now Chromium is actually what's used for a lot of different web browsers. I use one called Brave which basically just blocks ads and intrusive stuff. And Brave is running on Chromium. Even Microsoft is leveraging Chromium for Microsoft Edge, their browser. You know, they used to ever made fun of their Internet Explorer so they finally literally just copied Google Chrome's Chromium tool to, to basically build their, to build the browser. Now why do people use Chromium? I think one of the most interesting things that's the most valuable is all of the plugins that have been built onto Google Chrome. You can, all the extensions, sorry, you can actually use on these other browsers as well. So it's kind of a no brainer for, for these, you know, these firms to, when they create their browsers. You get access to all of those plugins if you use Google Chrome. So that's interesting. Google or Perplexity also included in their offer a promise to invest $3 billion into the open source project. So it's like, look, if you sell us chrome, we'll put $3 billion more into actually working on the project. So really that's like a 37 and a half billion dollar offer. And this is insane. This is, this is a very, very big offer similar to what Elon Musk bought X for not too long ago. Twitter for Plexity has promised that they're not going to change the user's default browser. Right. So they're not going to switch everybody that has Google as their default browser to Perplexity. They're also promising that so they do have basically their own AI powered option and they're going to not set that as a default. They'll leave Google. Google has been reached out to by multiple journalists and is not commenting on story. I'm sure Google's just kind of embarrassed as whole thing's happening. They're hoping to appeal, I think the antitrust stuff, they're hoping to appeal so that, you know, they basically are not going to want to have to spin Chrome out. This would probably be their worst nightmare. But all of this is coming. It's actually the Department of Justice that proposed in March that Google might be forced to sell Chrome basically because a judge ruled that they acted illegally to keep a monopoly in online search. Google has not agreed to sell Chrome. They, they said that they're going to fight this ruling. Spokesperson over at Perplexity said they believe that the court is soon going to set terms for the remedies maybe later this month. Google's also fighting another case where the judge ruled it was illegal and monopolized the ad tech space. The DOJ is proposing that Google be forced to divest two of its biggest products as ad tech products or it's going to break up its ad business. So Google's basically fighting this on multiple fronts and it's going to be interesting to see what happens. I don't know if, I honestly don't know if Google's going to be able to keep, keep it all together. I don't like the thought of like, I don't know, breaking up a company. But at the same time Google is massive. They have a lot of, they have a lot of different products and if they're, you know, being anti competitive, I don't know it, it would be definitely very interesting and a big interesting shake up. So when the Department of Justice first kind of proposed that Google divest Chrome OpenAI and Perplexity both said that they were interested in buying it. So this isn't just Perplexity. Open obviously is interested too. You can see the value would be just as strong for them because Chrome is obviously the biggest browser in the world. It has 68% market share according to stat counter. So if the courts basically rule that this is going to happen, that is going to be something that I think is going to be like a worldwide bid. I don't think Perplexity is going to be the only one bidding on this. You can imagine every company in the world might be interested. What's interesting though, is this the number that they actually bid at, right, $34 billion. One of the other competitors to Google, which is called DuckDuckGo, it's, I believe it's just kind of like no ads and like privacy first kind of Google competitor, they basically said that in April they were testifying on this case and they said that Chrome would be worth upwards of $50 billion. So if perplexity was actually able to get Chrome for 34 billion, that would be a massive discount. So I don't know if that's actually going to go through, but I think Perplexity more just wanted to say, look, we have an offer out there to kind of push things along, but still, this is more than, you know, anyone else has offered. One thing that I'll say is interesting about this whole deal and basically the reason people raise eyebrows and say this is a big marketing stunt for Perplexity is the fact that Perplexity to date has only raised $1.5 billion for their company. So they've raised one and a half billion dollars and they're offering an all cash deal of 34 billion. Now their CEO says that he's found investors that will back this acquisition through them, basically. So, you know, that would be kind of crazy. But it's interesting because their company basically has, you know, not raised an insane amount of money and the valuation is only $18 billion. So they're trying to acquire a quote, unquote, $34 billion company, which might actually be a $50 billion company, and they're trying to do it for 34 billion with only 1.5 billion raised to date so far. And for all of these reasons, many people think this isn't actually realistic. But then the question is, like, who could acquire this company, right? Who could actually pay $50 billion? What, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple. Like, why would we just take one massive, you know, one, one huge software from one massive company, pass it to another massive company? I just, I don't know if. I don't know. I don't know what problems we're really solving there, but maybe we are. I think another interesting thing to point out is the fact that Perplexity is also. Apparently they've submitted a bid to merge with TikTok. Trump has. TikTok's had this, like, troubled background for quite a while. Trump's first presidency, before he left, he said it had to get, like, sold to an American company because of Chinese data like issues, and it never was. And then Biden kind of like put it on pause and everyone thought it was done. And then Biden says something similar at the end of his presidency, and it seems like it's actually gonna happen now. So it'll be interesting to to see what happens with that. Perplexities, I guess, trying to merge with Tick Tock and acquire Chrome all at the same time. It could be some absolutely insane moves of one company benefiting a lot from some of the legal landscape in the United States right now. So very interesting to say the least. Hey, thank you so much for tuning into the podcast today. If you enjoyed it, make sure to leave a rating and review wherever you get your podcast. Make sure you go check out AI Box AI and I will catch you in the next episode.