Aravind Srinivas’s mother was disappointed when he was accepted into the University of California, Berkeley for his PhD instead of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, her hope for him. However, fate had other plans as he went on to intern at OpenAI and Google’s DeepMind on the west coast. Both companies became leaders in generative artificial intelligence (AI), paving the way for Aravind’s future success.
Aravind is a student of disruption and has noticed the differences in culture between OpenAI and DeepMind. He has used disruption theory to identify Alphabet’s vulnerability as Google’s parent company. Instead of explaining how Perplexity’s business model will take on Google search, he turns to “The Innovator’s Dilemma” by Clayton Christensen to make his case. Along with other generative-AI sites like You.com, he sees potential in disrupting Google with innovations like OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Despite his unassuming interview demeanor, Aravind is ambitious and aims to compete with Google search, one of the best business models of all time. His startup, Perplexity, is valued at $1bn and provides fast Wikipedia-like responses to search queries. He believes that by using disruption theory and focusing on innovations like ChatGPT, Perplexity can challenge Google’s dominance in the search marketplace. Some argue that Aravind’s argument is off-target but he remains confident that his vision for a more competitive search market will become a reality soon.