Perplexity AI CEO Aravind Srinivas: Indian American Aravind Srinivas was disappointed when he failed to get admission in Computer Science at IIT Madras. He has a dual degree (B.Tech and M.Tech) in Electrical Engineering from IIT Madras. According to a report in Business Today, Arvind Srinivas said, “I was disappointed that I did not get Computer Science in IIT Madras. My friends who were taking coaching with me for JEE (Joint Entrance Examination) all of them went into Computer Science. I was very depressed for a year.”

Arvind Srinivas tried to switch from Electrical Engineering to Computer Science after the first semester, but missed out by a narrow margin. He said, “At the end of your first semester IIT gives you the option to change your branch if you achieve a certain CGPA (Cumulative Grade Point Average), and I missed it by 0.01. I thought it was the end of the world. I was very angry at myself.” Srinivas's disappointment turned out to be a boon in the long run. Today Arvind Srinivas is the CEO of artificial intelligence-based search engine startup Perplexity AI.

established a company worth crores
Arvind Srinivas built a company worth crores on the basis of his own hard work. After doing B.Tech and M.Tech from IIT Madras, he also did PhD in Computer Science from the University of California. Arvind founded the AI firm Perplexity AI in 2022 along with Dennis Yarats, Andy Konwinski and Johnny Ho. However, before this, he did internships at DeepMind, Google and Open AI. Later he also played the role of a research scientist in OpenAI.

Search Engine Perplexity AI
Perplexity AI launched in 2022. This represents a paradigm shift in how we interact with the Internet's vast storehouse of knowledge. Unlike its predecessors, it does not rely only on surface level keywords. Instead, it deeply understands the context and nuances of user questions through advanced NLP and LLM. Perplexity AI is a search engine that uses generative AI to provide users with instant answers to their queries in their own language.

get better answers
Perplexity AI's platform uses various GenAI models developed in-house and by third parties, including Open AI and Meta's open-source model Llama. Its main feature is its chatbot-like interface that allows users to ask questions in your language, and the AI responds with a summary containing source quotes. This is quite the opposite to what we are used to searching on Google, which only provides us with a list of relevant pages, but nothing more.

How does Perplexity AI work?
Working on Perplexity AI is a simple process; You just need to enter your query directly on the platform. Whether you want factual information, clarification, or insight on a specific topic, formulating your query concisely will help Perplexity AI effectively understand your information needs. Then, Perplexity AI generates a results page that presents accurate and concise answers to your questions.

Access to reliable information
If you notice, this is similar to the feedback you would get from an LLM, direct and to the point. But unlike the search results you get on Google, which bombards you with a list of links, Perplexity AI uses the most relevant pages from the internet and then uses LLM to generate relevant answers. By adopting alternative search engines like Perplexity AI, users can overcome the limitations of traditional search engines and access unbiased and trustworthy information.

Funding received from Jeff Bezos
Arvind Srinivas's company had received funding of US $ 73.6 million, or about Rs 600 crore, from some people including American chip maker Nvidia and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos earlier this year. This funding round was led by Institutional Venture Partners with additional support from NEA and Databricks Ventures. It estimated the value of Perplexity AI at US$520 million i.e. Rs 4300 crore.