‘Spoke to Nikhil and Nithin’: Indian-American Perplexity CEO hints at Zerodha collab | Trending

The Indian-origin CEO of Perplexity AI has hinted at an upcoming collaboration with Zerodha. Aravind Srinivas said he has spoken to Nithin and Nikhil Kamath – the billionaire brothers behind India’s largest stockbroker – indicating that a big announcement is in the offing. Nikhil Kamath (L) is the co-founder of Zerodha, while Aravind Srinivas (R) is the co-founder and CEO of Perplexity AI. This comment from Srinivas comes shortly after his startup made an unsolicited $34.5 billion (over ₹3,02,152 crore) all-cash bid to acquire Google Chrome, according to a Reuters report. For some contextThis morning, Srinivas announced a new finance-focused feature within Perplexity AI. “Indian stocks are now covered on Perplexity Finance,” he wrote. “Zerodha when?” an X user asked him in the comments section. The Indian-origin, San Francisco-based CEO of Perplexity AI then hinted at a possible collaboration, revealing that he had already spoken to the co-founders of Zerodha. “Spoke to Nikhil and Nithin. Will have something to share soon,” wrote Srinivas. What is Perplexity AI?Perplexity is an AI-powered “answer engine”—a hybrid between a search engine and a conversational chatbot. It allows users to ask questions in natural language and receive answers that are supported real-time web search and source citations. A possible Zerodha collaboration? The talk of a Perplexity and Zerodha collaboration is not entirely out of the blue. Last week, an X user suggested that Perplexity team up with Zerodha to add Indian stock markets to the finance page of its Comet browser. Aravind Srinivas had responded to this suggestion tagging Nikhil Kamath, co-founder of Zerodha. “Absolutely, setting up a call for Monday…” Kamath responded. Perplexity’s offer to GooglePerplexity AI made a $34.5 billion unsolicited all-cash offer for Alphabet’s Chrome browser on Tuesday, a bid far above its own valuation as the startup reaches for the browser’s billions of users pivotal to the AI search race. Run Aravind Srinivas, Perplexity is no stranger to headline-grabbing offers: it made a similar one for TikTok US in January, offering to merge with the popular short-video app to resolve U.S. concerns about TikTok’s Chinese ownership. (Also read: ₹3302152 crore to Google just to buy…”>Indian-origin man offers over ₹3302152 crore to Google just to buy…) (With inputs from Reuters)