How To Build Billion Dollar AI Business - Elon Musk, Google & Future | Perplexity |FO349 Raj Shamani

Give me three examples of businesses. which are going to benefit from the. rapid adoption of AI. So software. development, healthcare, financial. consulting. What is the most ridiculous. search query you have read? Either this. person is trying to rob a bank. Ended up. asking I want my face protected. I still. want to be able to breathe but it should. cover my nose and holes for my eyes and. I want to like bike. Explain me how does. the answer comes in. A lot of it just. has to do with like filtering out like. really lowquality domains and then like. there are subtle things you can do based. on the region, based on the users's past.

queries, based on the current query. itself. You can rerank the final set of. like links. You're in a sort of. competition and race with all these. large companies. Who loses the most if. you win? The one with the most to lose. is Google. What would be Google be like? Google employees and their kids, they. all use Perplexity because it's a better. product. Our today's guest is Aravvin. Sri Navas who's a founder of perplexity. He has raised millions of dollars which. has gotten funded by Nvidia's founder. and Jeff Bezos as well. We learn how AI.

actually works and what's the future of. AI and what's the craziest conspiracy. you have heard about AI? AI god like. thing that you can use to control the. whole universe. But do you think that's. possible? Do you see any potential political. threats coming on. Perplexity? I think Elon raised $6. billion forex. Are you scared of Elon?

podcaster. Spotify enjoy the. show when you think about India or just. like let's say world and you want to. compete and you want to be the best you. want to be number one. why keep name as perplexity it's so.

difficult to say like I was talking to. so many people in the organization. because I use perplexity. And there are two three people who use. PEX and then when we spoke to everyone. that hey you know what we're going to. get the founder we'll do this and. they're like it's such a difficult name. we'll never going to be able to even. download it and use it. Sure. And it's a. it's an important question. Yeah. So uh. this goes back to the origins of the. company like you know when I started I.

didn't really have a clear sense of like. you know whether we'll build a search. app or consumer. application none of that like we were we. knew we wanted to do something in search. we knew like we wanted to build like. unique experiences that were not. possible before we're not dreaming big. like oh we're going to build a billion. user product potentially. Um, so, um, when when you pick a name for the. company, you pick something pretty cool. like and and easy to get a domain for,

you know, I I didn't have much money at. the beginning, no funding. So, uh, perplexity.ai was available for like. $120 for 2 years, so I just got it. Um, and um, perplexity is a metric in AI. that measures how well you understand. something. Okay. So, very geeky, you. know, I I get it. And once you get even. more users and more funding like we can. just buy the rights to some crazy name. and like just do something like four or. five letters that would be amazing. Mhm.

Interesting. Okay. So they there is plan. to actually change it. This is a problem. you're aware about. Yeah. Yeah. I mean. look I'm it's one of the worst names you. can pick for a consumer company. 100%. aware of it and I'm not going to defend. the maybe we can do something like the. comp the company will still be called. Perplexity but the product can be called. something else. Yeah. Fair. I was. looking at the list of your investors. Jeff Bezos happens to be one of them. Yeah. And he came much later like he's. not the earliest investor. Okay. But did.

you meet Jeff? Yeah. Yeah, I did meet. Jeff. How did that happen? uh how did. you go from being this guy who doesn't. know much about this business genius and. how this model will make sense. to getting a Jeff Bezos the Jeff Bezos. investing in you. So we reached out uh. through like a common contact like uh. and then um um you know they responded. saying okay like why don't you uh send. like a you know like a document like a. memo he he likes to read memos and so I.

I sent that and I also made like a nice. demo where uh it's an imaginary demo of. like Jeff talking to our our voice to. voice system where his voice is talking. to it and that system is responding back. and and the questions are about like. Star Trek and Blue Origin and things. like that and I I I recorded it myself. and then um sent it over both the memo. and this and um he for the first. investment he didn't even meet me. They.

just said, "Okay, I'll just seen the. memo and looked at the demo and um he's. approved the investment." So, okay, fine. That's awesome. And then we asked. for permission to use his name in the. public release of the funding round. They said, "Yeah, go for it." and that. became the headline essentially. So that. that really helped us like so thanks to. him. Um subsequent after that like when. we kept making more progress he reached. that was the first inbound request like. hey uh Jeff wants to meet and like you.

know get a update on the company and. like your strategy and again they asked. me to write a six pager I wrote it but. that's a really good exercise uh writing. these memos and six pages uh it takes a. lot out of you to write one but it's. totally worth it for your clarity and he. explains why too right it So, I've. written it and then had the one-on-one. meeting. It was for an hour. Um, I. thought he's not going to he he he. certainly wouldn't have had time to read.

it. Yeah. So, he's just going to use the. first 30 minutes to uh read it together, but no, like he just directly got to the. points. He referenced specific sections, what he liked and what he was not sure. about. Uh, asked me for things like what. I think about like the chip space and. stuff. Um, and no time was wasted. It's. it was like basically getting to the. second meeting, you know. Uh, and at the. end like he just said something of like. your your success doesn't rely on. Google's failure, which is why like, you.

know, I'm pretty optimistic about your. chances. And, uh, you just got to keep. moving fast. And of course, the only. thing that matters is customer. experience. Like just retain the users. Don't be a leaky bucket. Make sure. retention is high. Don't everyone's. going to like just push you for getting. as many users as you can but maintain. your growth rates. Don't try to aim for. like something crazy. Uh but absolutely. make sure that as you grow your. retention is like only increasing not. even staying flat. So he had all the.

right messages. I mean we we knew it but. it was always great to you know have it. reinforced by someone like him. And then. I met him in person in another event. later. So he the three I met him like. totally like two or three times. He's. he's pretty awesome. A lot of people. think he's like not very plugged in. anymore, but um I would say he's like. literally was up to date with everything. when I met him. What do you think is the. reason why did he invest in you? I I. mean look I I really don't know. He. probably What do you think? I know that.

you don't know. I mean he knows it. better, but what do you think? Why did. he I'm guessing he probably tried out. the product and like like you know it. worked as expected and I thought like it. you know it's but he must be getting. thousand products which are living up to. the expectation and working as described. or explained by you. Well, uh we had a. lot of visibility already by then a lot. of people using it. Um and. um there were very few products in the.

market at the time also like chat GPT. was there but it wasn't even doing. browsing reliably and you know Google. bar it was called Bard back then wasn't. even called Gemini and wasn't really. like good. Microsoft copilot wasn't. good. Bing chat wasn't good. So we. actually had a pretty good time to um. like attract a lot of users where like. our service is basically not uh possible. anywhere else. So that that. differentiator was clear there. It was.

not like one among another product. Um. and the other thing he probably my guess. is um the existing set of investors were. already pretty incredible. Uh the team. was shipping really fast. I I think. these are good attributes for a startup. and we were very efficient in the way we. got to where we were like before we. raised that round. We had raised very. little money. Uh and we did not spend it. on like you know like training our own. models but just continually investing in. a good product. We had a core thesis. that like your model is not my concern.

like for the user. Uh and I think that. appealed to him because it was literally. a play on his uh your profitability is. not my concern. Yeah. You get the. package in a day. I don't care what it. costs you to do that. So I think like it. was a customer focused AI company. Maybe. he wanted to be part of the journey. Got. it. And he probably liked the way you. were thinking about it way more than. probably any other thing. I really don't. know. I'm also making a guess asking. you. Maybe that demo was pretty cool.

like the I'm trying to prompt so that. you give me an answer which is beyond. just your product. It's very I've never. asked. Maybe next time I meet I'm just. going to ask him like hey like why did. you invest? Because honestly it's. um like you could argue like it's it's. going to create conflict at some point. like you know Amazon Alexa is also going. to be in in the operating in the space. and uh so maybe there's some deeper. reason or maybe it's not that deep. I.

don't know. Yeah, because it's usually. when someone of that stature actually. takes up personal time to a invest and. then meet the founders, it has to be. something deeper because I hope so. Couple of millions of dollars for him is. going to like it's peanuts. It's not. going to mean anything. Yeah, it's not. So he doesn't like it doesn't mean. anything to him. kind of again look like. if we become really big. um you know even then I think the the.

the valuation which he came in and the. amount he put in like it'll move the. needle for him a bit financially but. it's not it's not for that reason that's. like a lot of other ways for him to do. that exactly exactly and what what do. you think makes him special why is he. the number one why is he one of the. biggest founders in the world because. you met him did you notice or observe. anything different that makes him a star. founder? I think he has incredible. clarity of thought. Uh like the thing I. said like you know there there there.

some of the wisdom that he gave is. timeless. The your margin is my. opportunity thing is timeless like it. keeps on coming. It is the it is the. core uh truth to like most disruption. stories where uh someone else has to. protect their margin and they're on an. innovative dilemma situation and like. someone else eats the lunch with a. better technology. u and and like he has all these. frameworks right like repeatable. frameworks like one oneway door two-way.

door decisions where should you spend. your mind mental compute on um and a. shareholder letter is like a masterclass. in good writing. So my uh the reason I. really respect him is when you try to. scale a company uh you have to kind of. have u some version of you or your. thought process in every meeting. otherwise because it's physically and. like impossible for you to be in every. meeting and like driving decisions.

everywhere. So you have to be able to. write down how you think and how you. make decisions which is very going a. step further. It's not just about making. good decisions. It's. about writing down your decision making. framework so that others can think in a. way as clear as you. Yeah. That requires. even higher order clarity. And he did it. at Amazon and um and I scaled the. company a lot and built like many. businesses simultaneously.

Uh and I think that I'm I'm definitely. not at that level. I cannot do that. right now. Uh and I don't think many. CEOs are like that good either. True. Uh. so uh that that that is a very unique. Bezos thing like he he totally nailed. the like shareholder letters and like. decision-m frameworks and like how to. understand the markets. Even recently uh. in an interview with Sarkin he said this. thing that was like very profound which. is like you know uh we are uh we usually.

overestimate risk and underestimate. opportunity almost all of us and a. corollary of that is like we don't take. enough risk like we are all like. uh we don't we don't like like there's a. reason why most humans are not. risk-seeking animals and another thing. he said in the Lex Friedman interview. was very cool like you know We we all. talk about truth seeeking, but there's a. reason that it's not easy is because by. by by.

nature human beings are not truth. seeeking animals. We are social animals. We like validation. We like like other. people saying we're good or like what. we're saying is correct. We don't care. if like what we're saying is actually. correct by by nature. You actually have. to rewire yourself for that. And that. any rewiring process is painful. So I I. think like that clarity of thought is. what is making makes him pretty. singular. I am a big Jeff Basos fan. Like it's in my list of entrepreneurs in. the world. He comes at the top. Like.

he's the number one because obviously. all of these frameworks and the things. that he has done. Yeah. I think it makes. ton of sense and I can go on and on him. because I've read so many things and. I've like used so many of his frameworks. to make decisions in my day-to-day life. All the dumb decisions that I've made in. my life which have actually turned out. to be good was because of this one. regret minimization framework that I've. heard from him. It's so good. Like.

regret minimization framework. Oh my. god. And that has made me do dumb things. in my life. But in most cases it has. been a pretty lovely one. Yeah. I mean. that's one of the main reasons I I I was. so um um I was having a lot of urgency. to start the company because I I knew. that um well I had I had some so my own. reasoning too which is I knew that my. cognitive abilities are on a decline. You have to accept that. Yeah. Um how.

old are you? I'm 30 but I I I I know. that I'm on a decline. I I can try to. fight it, but I I can clearly see the. kind of insane things I could do when I. studied for J or uh when I was at IIA, you know, cramming last minute before. the exam. I could download like 10. lectures in my head in the last 3 hours. I can't do all those things anymore. Um so I wanted to do it as soon as I. can. And the regret minimization.

framework was also clearly there which. is look it's only going to get harder to. start a company because of both your. abilities and other constraints in your. life that come. So you're the regret's going to go up. and your abilities are going to go down. So you better like start now. Yeah. But. okay explain me how does the answer. comes in. So moment I talk I type. something in perplexity and I type the. question. Yeah. Does it show based on my.

interest and what I would be interested. in or does it show based on some level. of merit like what is the way that you. show me because as far as I understand. about Google it depends a lot on the. location I'm in my past history what. kind of things I'm interested in then. Google shows me some lot set of those. things and maybe like keywords and stuff. like that but a lot depends on two. individual people we have tried this. multiple times two people from the same. location searching the same thing.

probably shows like three four top. things right so I think in in the case. of Google the reason you see different. results um might not even be. personalization mhm um Google runs AB. tests a lot um ranking algorithm AB test. um UI AB tests u number of ads on on the. query there's a lot of other things that. end up making the result pretty. different per user the biggest level of. personalization you can make is. um location actually that that gives you.

most of the heavy lifting in terms of. personalization. So the what we do when. you ask a query is you we pull up. relevant results uh from an index we. have we look at ranking signals that we. can get from many different search. engines. We pull them all together in a. with a proprietary algorithm and then we. let the model like read all those. retrieved links uh pull relevant. paragraphs use that to write a. synthesize an answer and pull the final. citations and allow you to keep.

conversing by keeping things in context. Keeping the past sources, past answer, past query in context. As it grows, it. gets more challenging and we do all this. like pretty minimal latency that makes a. product feel fast yet pretty useful. M. so the hard part is actually the. orchestration. Uh you can do a lot in. what links you retrieve in the first. stage that can make the answer quality. really really good without even. improving the model. Um a lot of it just. has to do with like filtering out like.

really low quality domains that gives. you a lot of heavy lifting to like. quality improvements. Um and then like. there are subtle things you can do based. on the region um based on the user's. past queries based on the current query. itself. You can rerank the final set of. like links. Um and we do all that. Uh. but we've generally seen that like. location gener like are are like big. predictors of what final set of links. that you need to retrieve and any more.

personalization can improve the quality. a bit but uh most users or most queries. are not going to see the differences. So. if you and me type the same problem here. together are there chances that we'll. see the same answer? most likely you. will unless by the way as products and. companies get bigger u a lot of AB tests. are run um pretty much every day uh. because that's the only way to improve. the product so if you see different. answers it either means like different. models were used for that or like um the.

query like reformulated the ones that. are taking your original query and. changing it a bit uh those models were. different uh or like the ranking. algorithms were different you. Literally for bad query if you get. different answers the only reason has to. be like AB tests and you cannot do. anything about it like every product has. to do this because the only way to. iterate to improve is run AB tests on. hold out sets and and see if like the.

retention was higher or like number of. queries so that user ended up going up. or there were more follow-ups to that. question that were like relevant but not. like recclarifying the original query so. that means the original answer was. correct. We we we collect a lot of. signals like this. Um and so. um my hope is that even if you see a. different answer like it ends up. conveying the same thing rather than uh. one answer is like completely.

contradictory to the other. Got it. So. now do you get in investor meetings now. that you have some such start investors. you have bunch of capital now capital is. never enough though but you have capital. and you have good investors. Yeah. Right. You're a soft bank as well. You. have a soft bank, Stanley Draen Miller, a bunch of really great people. Like. bunch of great people right now. Do you. go into your board meetings or investor. meetings and be like, "Hey, you know. what? I'm going to beat Google." No, we. we don't talk about how to beat Google. Um I think we just talk about how to.

grow Perplexity. This very being very. honest with you. like um I think the. Google positioning is very interesting. mainly because like there's a reason. they cannot ship the same product to. billion users yet uh because of the. invader dilemon situation. So it's very. interesting. Uh but they're also very. clear right about that and they're. building Gemini and they're trying to. like make it as you know at least like. oh if there is a an app that truly kills. Google it better we we also own one of.

it right my hope is that in the next. generation of search where we're all. going to converse and ask questions on. voice and get tasks done. I hope there. are multiple players there and Google. will certainly be one of them. There's. no question about it. and OpenAI will be. one of them. We hope to be one of them. MetaB is likely to be one of them. XAI. So, I'm I'm hoping like there are a. lot of players here and u it's a much. more. um I still think there'll be a winner.

with a dominant market share, but I hope. it's like um it's not like a. 90% winner and like 10% rest and and. that can be avoided if you're like. having enough capital to compete and. like innovative on like features you're. shipping and figure out like new. business models outside subscriptions, uh new ways for commerce must happen. here. You have to do all that work. There's a lot of nonAI work to be done. here. And um so we talk a lot about.

those kind of things in board meetings. rather than like oh how can I get. everyone's like. uh you know single word searches that. are happening on Google on perplexity. That's impossible. I'm not going to get. it unless like I literally displays your. browser your operating system everything. right like that. That's not worth. thinking about. Rather it's worth. thinking about like okay there are some. kind of searches that clearly people are. coming to perplexity for not going to. Google what how to grow that those kind. of searches which is actually new right. we were not earlier at least me we were.

I was not going to Google like type in. like a full quest than ever. so that's a new ability that people some. people are not even aware they can do. and that that'll grow and um I think. that market how to monetize that how to. grow that how to like bring it to more. verticals, how to get in front of more. users, that's where it's really worth. focusing energy on. Okay. Compare for a. layman like me and for all the viewers. who are watching. Compare Google with.

Perpacity for me. What are the. weaknesses which Google has? Yeah. And. those are the weaknesses or the gaps. that you guys have seen and you're. solving it for it. Yeah. So the median. number of words on a Google search is. like two to three words. I think 2.3. words maybe. The median number of words. on a perplexity search is like 10 words. So um people on Google like if you. actually go to. trends.google.com and and look at the. top one not the rising ones the top ones. are always like single word searches.

Amazon, Instagram, Reddit, Tik Tok. Mhm. Weather score cricket you know it's like. single word searches. Um and that tells. you what people are mostly doing. They're just navigating the web. You. know, sometimes they ask like very quick. fa fast facts like such in Tanuker age. or something. You know, you just quickly. get it right there. But you're not. asking questions like oh like uh what. how many times has Tendulkar uh scored a.

um 100 and India has lost the match. You're probably not going to get it. quickly on Google. It'll give you a. bunch of links. You'll have to open. them. You have to read and parse and. figure out. You can ask those kind of. questions on perplexity. You can ask. such nooker age also on perplexity but. there's going to be some overlap in the. searches that we can share but there are. just going to be some searches that are. clearly better done on Google which is. the quick fast navigation and there are. going to be some searches that are. better done on perplexity which is.

actual answers to questions. Now you can. ask me how many people are really asking. these kind of complicated questions. Today not so much. We get 20 million. queries a day and you know maybe like. 80% of them are like pretty deep. questions but over time it's going to. grow. You're not just going to ask those. kind of weird esoteric questions. You're. going to ask things like oh like how do. I fix my how do I renew my other card? I'm I'm actually outside the US or like. my passport tour and like I I'm I'm. stuck stuck in this country. What what. do I do? Like these are the kind of.

questions that are going to like grow. Yeah. And I think uh you're not going to. go to Google to that for two reasons. One is Google uh was never like meant. for that. It's ingrained in you is not. that user habit yet. So that muscle. memory is not something that we're. competing with. So we can actually like. be the product go to product for that. Number two is even if they ship things. like AI overview or like answers right. there, it they don't actually know when. to like um do that when when not to and.

it becomes a uh you know like a kitchen. sink of so many different UIs in one. search page which really frustrates the. user and it actually competes with their. ad business u and like revenue traffic. right so um that's where I think we have. a clear opportunity and this category. searches is going to grow uh. exponentially in the next 5 to 10 years. and we won't be the only person to. capture that market. I think chat GPT.

will also compete even though chat GP. started off as a writing tool they're. also like going more towards these kind. of uh prompts and Gemini will also be a. player in this but it's going to be a. pretty interesting uh new market that's. emerging. Yeah. So without even knowing. about this you're right I use perplexity. for this only like and it's so. subconscious that I use it for XYZ. reason because probably the first time I. asked question it showed me the kind of. answers which made me ask more deeper.

questions. So I would really go on. Google and be like hey Sachin. Dendelkar's age. or how much this person's spending or. whatever like some random very easy one. word kind of answer and then I would go. on perplexity and be like okay what's a. specific core message of this person in. this speech in this year right and then. this is the specificity I go to and then. I get an answer yeah by the way I I. would say just you know like for.

the correct correctness of it. both. sides will do what the other side is. doing like we'll be we'll try to get. even faster at like quick fast facts. like such a 10 age or um how much did. the India spend on transportation those. kind of like things um and it'll make. the experience better for you so that. you don't have to go somewhere else for. those questions like why even the user. burden of deciding when to use what tool.

um and at the same time Google will also. try to get better at like you know like. like. pull-ups that require multiple hops of. reasoning. So both things are going to. happen and that's why it's interesting. moment for the user like u of like who's. going to deliver the best orchestrated. product. Is it the one that's starting. from answers or is it the one that. already has links and these one box. answers? Nobody knows, right? Because. you can argue in both favor like the.

more general system can build the final. solution faster versus the legacy system. that's trying to like you know layer in. things together. What would beating. Google be like it would feel amazing. like there I I was definitely inspired. by Larry and Sergey a lot and the. founding story of Google the academic. roots they're deeply inspir I mean I've. worked as an intern there both deep mind. and brain and a lot of the Google. culture engineering focus I'm big fan of. that. So it would feel great to have a. product that uh look I think the true.

test is if even people within Google. like Google employees and their kids. they all use perplexity instead of. Google because it's a better product not. because they want to like they they stop. liking Google and they move for it but. like they truly there's no other choice. you have to use it because it's a better. product. I think that is the true true. uh benchmark and that's going to take a. while but what would it look like? Okay. So you said it'll be feel amazing but. what would it look at like at what point.

will you know that okay we have done. better job. two three markers yeah like so today we. do like 20 million daily queries right. uh it has to get to like uh two orders. of magnitude more like two billion now. you can say it's even that's lower than. what Google does like I think Google. does like around 6 to 8 something like. that but uh because of the query length. here uh I I would say that we we've done. the job. Um and um you can see it right.

like look the the younger generation has. less loyalty to Google as as we do. So. they're actually the older generation. allows these voicetooice systems. The. younger generation also allows using. these uh conversational systems. So we. so I think it's going to be very. interesting to see how the behavior of. the new generation changes. Uh so so one. way to mark like a marker is like what. what product do they use when they grow. up. Uh and my prediction is it won't be.

all Google. Let's play the long game. here. Like it's not necessary to win. every single user. Yeah. Um and I think. that mentality of like, oh, I'm the next. Google means I need to have 90% market. share should go away. I think no one's. going to be that next Google. So when I. say we're competing with Google, I'm. only saying about the core search. experience. Yeah. Not the Alphabet unit. or the Google stock. So a lot of people. like use this, you know, criticism for. us saying like, oh, like look at this. competitor, but then Google stock keeps. going up. Okay, listen, like they have.

like so many other businesses and I'm. not saying the stock is going to go down. ever. Like it's a safe investment to. make. They have VHO, they have like so. many new businesses that are coming up. Deep mine, uh, Alpha Fold, like Quantum. Ships. So it's it's a great company, but. the core search product for the first. time ever in like two decades uh is. clearly under threat. If if it was not. under threat, they wouldn't be doing. like Gemini AI overview, right? Yeah. Interesting. Okay. So is it fair to say. that the success would look like when an.

entire generation would use your product. as a default? The way one generation. uses Google as a default. That would. like that would beating Google mean like. yeah or or having a higher market share. there like like that's what like entire. generation like a majority of the. generation using one thing. Yeah. Exactly. Let's say like it's split like. you know 40 30 20 uh 10 with with among. four tools. I don't know what they are.

Maybe ask like Microsoft Google M like. something like that right? I I think. that would be a pretty big win. And um I. hope like unanimously the the global. aggregate is that and that would be an. even massive win but um even like one. generation would be a great win. Where. do you stand today? Give me give me some. comparison. I'm interested in this. Let's say right now the AI AI usage is. like I think chat has 80% market share. right now as far as I'm aware. And you u.

it's all depend depends on the web and. the mobile. I believe on the web we are. uh third and Gemini is second. On mobile. I think Gemini has more installs but. extremely poor retention. So in terms of. actual usage on mobile I I wouldn't be. surprised if we're number two. Um and I. think like Copilot has a lot of installs. too but lower retention than us. Uh but. clear winner right now both web and. mobile is. CHD and but that doesn't need to remain.

the case. Yeah. Uh and that's why it's. really interesting. And uh in terms of. funding, if you want to compare yourself. with let's say a chat GPT, Google and. you where do you stand? Oh, come on. Like Google Google has like hundred. billion dollars in cash. Yeah. And chat. GPT has raised uh I mean as an open AI. Yeah. They've raised um the last round. was probably like 10 billion and I think. they're going to raise more and they've.

already raised like 13 billion. So in. total they raised 20 billion or 25. billion, right? And they can definitely. have they have the brand to raise more. Yeah. So we we have not even raised a. billion so far in in total. How much. have you raised total? I mean uh in. total we've raised around like 800 or. 900 million, right? So, and the last. round was around. Yeah, we raised 500 in. the last round. So, clearly like from. one end, if you look at our funding. rounds, it looks.

massive. But on the other hand, these. are like three like like one has 100, another has like you know raised 20 but. burning five like losing 5 billion a. year. So, it's not exactly same and us. is like we raise not even a billion. So, clearly these are three different uh. like orders of magnitude on the. spectrum. Um, but the nice thing is like. just because you have the money doesn't. mean you. win. Um, like like I said, if that was.

true, then we would never have been even. being in the conversation. Yeah. Uh, so. the one who can ship the best product. has like a good chance uh lower. bureaucracy, faster movement, lower. distractions, clear right focus on just. the product. Definitely has like a lot. of advantages here. So what we need to. ensure is like keep growing our usage, keep growing our brand and mind share. uh figure out ways to like monetize well. too so that we don't just end up with. like a big pile of cash and a lot of.

users but don't know how to turn that. into real business. We don't want to be. in that sort of spot either. So but. don't like uh overemphasize revenue over. growth. So that we we if we can ensure. we get these basics right over the next. two years and keep shipping cool things. and staying ahead of the rest and core. user experience then we have a good shot. at like playing this game. But if we. don't like there's nothing we ship that.

others don't ship in like a matter of. weeks or months. Mhm. Uh and if we are. not growing our user base uh and if we. don't know how to monetize the existing. user base well we're definitely going to. be in a difficult spot. And your current. focus is revenue or growth? growth. So. you're not going to focus on revenue for. a while. We we'll make good revenue to. the extent that like at least on the. paying users we have good margins and. the free users the cost of running the. service keeps going down because these. models get cheaper and we'll figure out. ways to make it cheaper algorithmically.

too. But we're not going to obsess about. like making revenue and turning the. company profitable next year. Yeah. Okay. And then what about XAI? You read. the news yesterday. They just. circulated. I think Elon raised $6. billion for XAI. Yeah. Are are you. scared of Elon? I mean, come on. Like what? It's not scare. I'm I'm a. fan. Like, he's a, you know, inspirational entrepreneur for me. Um, and I think it's cool that he's also.

building something here in the space and. I would never underestimate him. It's. the quote is like never bet against Elon. Musk. that my hope is like there's a lot. of people who you know um there's not. like one product everybody uses here you. know there's a lot of people use. different apps and he's also going to. work in the search space clearly like. rock's doing some Mhm. web sources. too. Uh my sense is like there are a lot. of verticles to build here. Um there is.

finance, shopping, travel, local, weather, news, um. sports, like so even within each of. these there's so many subtles. um and like entertainment is there, shows. So there's a lot of things to do. here that like. um some products will be amazing at some. things, some products will be worse at. other things. And I feel um Elon's entry. just makes the whole market even bigger. that if it takes if some if something is.

worth his time then it just means like. the market's huge and but does it bother. you? Does it scare you in some say? No. because they're already like a lot of. star players and the big players with. big deep pockets and then there's Elon. as well now he's entering into this this. space where you are operating and you. are three you're number third right now. you want to escalate to number two and. then eventually number one but then. there's this guy and you said the world. says that don't bet against Elon right.

yeah I mean by that I mean like he's not. going to lose he's definitely going to. have a good market share is going to win. in in some manner. No, but what does it. mean? Like if someone like him raises. the money, does it mean raising money. for you gets difficult? U so it's it's. it's complicated like obviously you know. um money is not infinite sum right. Um similarly GPUs are not infinite sum. like there there there are some zero sum.

games there because just constraints in. the world how much capital there is and. how many GPUs you can make. Yeah. So. yeah definitely like there are some. advantages having a lot of capital but. at the same time uh it's also how you. spend it. Uh so XAI for example has. raised $6 billion out of which they. intend to spend five billion on just. building a data center with a million. GPUs. At least that's what I read. Maybe. it's wrong. Maybe it's an overestimate. but let's just assume that they spend 60.

to 70% of the cash on just building data. centers. So uh that's not how we are. spending our money. So the amount. they're actually spending on the core. product and making it better uh will be. probably comparable on a yearly basis. Uh, and I think that gives you a pretty. good shot if you're not training your. own models. Um, and now you can ask. like, oh, what if they train an insanely. better model than the rest? Yeah, that. this makes their product way better that. no matter if you use other people's.

models, you're not going to be as good. as them. again like it's. possible but I wouldn't give it a very. high probability because um so far the. trends are that models are like there. are like too many players and they're. all like playing ping pong and like it's. very evenly contested like anthropics. there Google's there meta's there openai. is there so um I think there's good um. thesis for a company like us which can. use all of them and just focus on the.

user so now that He's a part of the. government as well. Does it give him any. edge? I mean my my sense is like he's. never really taken any advantage of that. and like for example not yet. Okay. Like. I I would just go by past actions are a. good predictor of future and he um owns. X. Yeah. Right. But it's not like he um. deamplified any of his rivals tweets or. company rivals's tweets. So he could.

have done that like just gone to the. algorithm like tweaked the knobs to like. lower the engagement score for those. tweets. He could have done that and like. hurt the marketing efforts of everybody. except he himself he has he's never done. as far as I know OpenAI always dominates. the Twitter. discussions and he owns the platform. He. lets them thrive on it despite his. rivalry. So I think he that that already. shows like he doesn't combine like his. power or ownership or something that's.

very powerful with like his business. interests. So I think like whatever work. he's going to do in the government I. would just assume that u he truly cares. about the country and he's not like. combining his business interests with. that. You also said in Lex Freedman's. podcast that perplexity is not succumb. to political power the way Google is. What do you mean by that? like you know. Google in the past has been like accused. of. um like at least like ranking uh bias.

where if you tried Trump news you would. get both it would kind of reformulate. your query to like Harris Trump and give. you like both articles. u whereas for um if you just type Harris. news you'll just get her news. or uh autocomplete when you type in. Google that your query are auto. suggested, right? If you type Donald. like the the next suggestion is duck and. not Trump and Trump doesn't even show up.

in the other list of suggestions. At. least three or four instances like these. like um where Google clearly had some. ranking bias. Um I think like for. example the Joe Rogan Trump podcast when. people went to search for on YouTube you. couldn't even find it. So we we don't have these issues as far. I mean we as far as I'm aware like we've. tried to be pretty politically neutral. Um. and again it's easy to build from a.

clean slate than having something and. trying to correct it. Mhm. Um but at the. same time um I'm also reading news of. Sundar meeting Trump a lot and like. Sergey went and met Trump and Sundar. clearly sent out an email saying gone. are the days where we had like political. opinions and the only thing we care. about is our mission delivering correct. information. So clearly like they're. changing and so maybe what I said you. know in the Lex podcast one year ago may. not be relevant now. Do you see any.

potential political threats coming on. Perplexity at some point? I see. Um, look, you don't know like there are. always unknown unknowns. If there is. some article that said something. negative about somebody and uh that. surfaced in an answer and like someone's. upset about it and um even though the. answer gives all perspectives. u there are chances that some group of. people could get upset about it, right? So u anytime when a group of people are. involved and their sentiments are hurt.

there's like room for politics to become. part of it and and it may not even. happen in America it might happen in. some other country and censorship and. free speech have like different levels. of relevance in each country. So um. we're open to like you know working with. each government look like individual. government like what they think is. reasonable for their country. We have to. abide by their rules right. Uh I've been. very clear about this like Google in the. beginning I think they had all these. opinions of like them being about.

governments and like you know what they. really care about is like um true. freedom like that that sort of like you. know you can read their culture don't be. evil like just be free and they refused. to operate in China when China wanted to. censor them. So u reality is like. everyone's a capitalistic business at. the end of the day. Yeah. you know, they're all competing to win government. contracts. At one point, Google Cloud. employees.

um protested that Google's working with. the Pentagon and now like they just. fired those people who did it again and. they're competing with Amazon and. Microsoft to win those contracts because. clearly that moves their revenue up and. moves the stock up and that's what the. shareholders want, right? So, um I think. like we we're not going to repeat those. mistakes of like what they went through. where. they forgot that they were actually a.

company and like trying to like have. political opinions and things like that. Like we're going to be like a proper. well-run business at the end. great. product. Like we want to be a great. product, but we have clear. responsibility to like our shareholders. and we're not going to like confuse that. with. like my agenda or like someone else's. agenda that all that stays outside the. company. But would you lose out on these. opportunities even if it means. sacrificing revenues for your company?

What what do you mean by lose out on. options? lose out on opportunities of. trying to maybe partner with some. person, some government, somebody who. wants little bend in your rules and in. your platform so that it shows searches. in their favor. Mhm. But that means you. winning lot of government contracts, you. winning a lot of revenues and eventually. that maximizing your company's value. Complicated question, right? like what I. I don't want to say something that'll be. held to like obviously uh we'll try to.

do what's like right as as as to the. best of our abilities as possible. Um but if a certain government has rules. that you have to obey if you want to. like just think about it leave us even. you as an individual if a certain. government has rules. u of what you can do and not do and you. want to continue there and like run your. business there you will follow it right. or you have to move out. Yeah. The same. thing applies to a business like us but. sometimes it's not rules it's just few.

influencers calling you. Mhm. That's it. It's not about the rules. Like rules are. pretty much black and white and you can. be freedom of speech. You can show. whatever you want to show. But maybe the. ruling party wants something else. because these are the political. pressures which probably a Google faces. or meta faces or maybe Twitter says like. X now. Jack Dorsey has been very vocal. about it that specifically about Indian. government and a lot of other. governments in the world that there are.

some pressures that they have to. actually listen to. I mean like I I just. look at the fact that even uh someone. like Elon way more influential than me. and way more opinionated than me. Um. like like how he's handled like conflict. with countries in different ways like. with I think there was conflict with. India at some point there was conflict. with Brazil at some point and I think. the way he went about it was different. Mhm. So um so long answer short it's.

very complicated because you're in India. I want to talk about challenges of. India. Okay. What do you see like where. is India today in terms of in the world. of AI? How far are we from becoming even. a contender in the AI world? Yeah. Like. I mean I'm sorry if I'm repeating what I. said earlier but I think we are very. well positioned in terms of adoption. like we've already adopted a lot like. 92% of knowledge workers have adopted AI. here compared to 65% of global average.

elsewhere um so the amount of people who. already know how to use these tools and. like um can keep themselves updated with. it is pretty awesome you don't need to. like train them or something like when I. went to Japan I I saw like uh there were. like actual courses on how to learn chat. GBT or like all these different tools. that people writing books on how to use. perplexity. I don't think you even need. these things here. People are already. like pretty u acclimatized to these.

things. Um what are the challenges that. you see here? I think the challenges are. how can people using these tools earn. more? They should they should ideally because. uh they should be able to do more work. now. uh faster throughput. So, I hope like. the usage goes beyond just like. identifying hacks and cheat codes to get. work done faster to like, okay, this. thing is actually making my life so much.

easier. So, I'm going to like figure out. side gigs that I can do and earn more. and and if like a bunch of people start. doing that, um the average income goes. up and GDP goes up. So, that needs to. happen. I hope it's already happening to. at least at a small scale, but that. really needs to happen. Uh the second. thing a challenge I would say is okay. now that you guys really know how to use. these tools and you get a sense of it. Um can you start building apps and.

businesses that can let um other people. use things in a way that are not. possible with the existing tools whether. you build it for the Indian market or. the international market doesn't matter. but build something that doesn't exist. yet and um get it in the hands of like. 100 million people here and um create. new um market caps from nothing right. employ new people here and they give. them opportunities. So that's again.

creation of value that needs to happen. So uh the bright side is we know how to. use these tools. Uh the flip side is. like we have to figure out how. to increase the GDP of our country per. capita GDP is more important of our. country through these things and I. really hope like one um advantage that. we have healthcare is uh looked upon. more seriously as an opportunity space. So you said people should start earning. more. Yeah. Give me three examples of.

businesses which are going to benefit. from the rapid adoption of AI. I would. say healthcare. Okay. I would say like a. lot of like software development easily. like you know a lot of other companies I. think like there are a lot of. independent consultants here who like do. coding gigs for others. I think they can. do a lot more now per unit time. Um so. software development, healthcare, I. think just financial consulting. Um how. a financial consultant can use AI to.

give better. Yeah. So take have the AI. look at your portfolio and have the AI. go and research the web on like latest. news related to each of these stocks. uh. read analysis reports, private reports. prepared by all these banks like Goldman. Sachs or Barclays uh sellside reports. and then come back with investment. advice of like what you should be like. changing to adjust it or um new um. stocks that you should be looking into.

new changes equivalent of like several. hours of actual research that an analyst. doesn't charge us for. If you can have. an AI do it, arbitrage that and give it. to more people who usually don't get. access to these kind of uh. consultants and allow everybody wants to. make money and you take some cut of. that. Yeah. And like create mark value. from nothing, right? So AI based. financial advisor, AI based healthcare. advisor or maybe agents who are.

connecting you to doctors or just. allowing you to get quick checks on like. what's happening to you, uploading your. reports, having it be audited by an AI. and then using that going to a doctor. Um all these things are like clear. opportunities. Okay. And what are the. businesses that are going to feel the. maximum tension because of AI? they're. going to fail because of adoption of AI. software consulting right like if you. can get work done with the help of an AI. co-pilot coding co-pilot like you're no.

longer like going to rely on like like a. huge form of dev shops uh customer. support like you know call centers I. think voice agents are going to be able. to do a lot of these things pretty well. we should try to disrupt it ourselves. like whoever is going to these call. centers and doing these calls and like. we should try to like do it with a you. know AI as much as we can. Uh so. obviously some people who are going. there are going to lose their jobs but. uh whoever is like running these.

businesses can potentially have higher. margins too and those margins can be. used to give those people that are. potentially going to lay off like. different kind of jobs right I think we. got to do some restructuring there okay. these are the two places where you see. the most I have two three like fun. questions one is what is the most. ridiculous and bizarre search query you. have read I think someone like ended of. asking something very particular for. like oh like I I want my. um face protected. I I still want to be.

able to breathe but it should cover my. nose and like it should just have the um. holes for my eyes and I want to like. bike uh in the winter for Thanksgiving. like help me figure out like which city. I can go to and like what I should buy. like and we ended up giving him like a. really nice like product recommendation. Okay. And when when we actually saw like. we saw that product getting purchased, either this person's trying to um rob a. bank or or they're really like in a cold.

place. So we went and actually like. checked query and the query was so long. and again like this is the kind of thing. that people are very creative and like. using these products that you know. Interesting. And what's the craziest. conspiracy you've heard about AI? Well, there's always this conspiracy theory of. like uh AI this. AGI is this god like thing that you can. use to control the whole.

universe by um building super. intelligent entity. Mhm. And whoever has. access to that will be the mastermind. Yeah. And uh you know some people think. Sam Alman ultimately wants that but I I. I don't think it's it's that level. of power craze. By the way there is true. power in in being the u CEO or the chief.

decision maker of a company that's. building the most intelligent. model. But I don't think it's being. built with the intention of controlling. the universe. M. but do you think that's possible? I. think it's uh going to be like you know. it's not going to like fool people in. doing things. It's possible by the way. that like a very intelligent AI can. manipulate people. Yeah. But I think the. power games are not going to come from. those things like it's not like oh. politician wants to have access to it to.

to win the next election or something. they can do it. But the real danger is. going to be more from. um if you can throw like the equivalent. of 100 most intelligent. scientists but working 24/7. um on like a very hard pharma problem, figure out a new um. drug and like the next or something and. sell it for a crazy premium.

um and you completely own the solution. The only way you even got to the. solution is you had the ability to spend. that much inference. compute. Um so those kind of situations. are we are like one country getting uh. the end output of a very super. intelligent AI that they can use to. their advantage in the market. Mhm. And. then uh because of that the next thought. effects are another country trying to. steal it in some manner. and that.

leading to like defense problems and. warfare you know those kind of. situations are possible those are the. big and real worries that's what I think. will happen if we have like super. intelligence I'm not talking about. general intelligence super intelligence. is a weird thing it's it's it's not a. thing we understand today because we're. not used to super intelligence it. doesn't really exist there there are. people that have been extraordinarily.

intelligent like Einstein, but you wouldn't call even Einstein. super intelligent. He cracked like three. or four very important problems. Yeah. But it's not like he there was an. equivalent of a computer Einstein that. just oh I could throw any domain any. problem at that computer and they would. come up with the equivalent of theory of. relativity for that problem that has. massive like economic impact too that. doesn't exist but once it exists. whichever country has it the next. country that's trying to compete for. being the world superpower will also.

want it. Yeah. If you happen to be that. person when you get and you are at the. top of the pedestal, you become the most. powerful person in the world of. supercomputers and AI. What would you. do? I'm happy I'm not even in that. place. I think it's a very weird um. position to be. I've been wanting to ask. this from the point we started. Right. You're in a sort of competition and race. with all these large companies and.

incredibly successful founders, right? Who loses the most if you win? I think. like I mean I've never thought about it. in a zero sum way. There are clearly. some zero sum games with some other. companies. undoubtedly. Um I think it's not about. whether we win. Um, whoever is going to. crack this AI native answer engine. assistant, let's say you cracked it, okay? Whoever cracks it, the one with.

the most to lose is. Google and and that's simply because of. their current business model. M. now by the time someone cracks it if. their other bets YouTube cloud and all. that they increase the margins there and. they figure out a way to like make way. more even more successful meanwhile and. get some new cash flow there and explain. to the shareholders that like look this. is clearly an inflection moment but like. we have other things and we'll be fine. and we'll go for the new thing too. It's.

not like they're going to get destroyed. but they definitely are going to have a. difficult turbulent period. So yeah, they they have the big most to lose in. this game and they're aware of it and I. think they're working on it. Got it. You. know, my one worry is with the rapid. adoption of AI. This happened with all. the technologies which are coming is. increase of digital amnesia. So it's. like a phenomena where people forget. information on day-to-day basis a lot.

because they rely on technology. Oh. right. Right. Yeah. That's right. That's. fair. So it's like so compared to like. our parents generations the way we. calculate things is our ability to. calculate simple math problems has gone. because we use calculators. Similarly. when I see my younger cousins they do it. their ability to just remember. information is so low because they are. like Google first chat GPD perplexity. kind of people who are just constantly. using these. Yeah. So increase of.

technology is going to just increase the. digital amnesia where people are. forgetful left, right, center. Yeah. Okay. Let me put it this way. I are you good at like driving with a. physical map versus using Google maps? Correct. Google maps of course. But but. I think the previous generation like our. our previous generation wouldn't have. needed Google maps. They would have. taken a physical print out and like. figured out Yeah. Yeah. that like like. they would have mapped what they see in. front of them to the 2D layout and. figured it out. they wouldn't need like. accurate. It's very dynamic, right? But.

so little things like how do your brain. functions because if you if you remember. a little thing then it gives you. confidence to remember like the bigger. things as well. So today it could be as. small as something like let's say. remembering a phone number. We don't. nobody even cares about it. But that. habit of telling or signaling our brain. that hey you need to remember this. little thing is getting down down. Yeah. So that's why that's which which I think. is totally okay by the way. Which is.

okay. I'm I'm saying like a lot of. things a lot of times what is happening. I'll tell because I was reading some. survey which is going on is not proven. yet. I think some university in. Australia is doing it where they're. they're testing that pe more and more. young people are forgetting to take. medicines on time. I see. But they don't. remember like just a small thing. You. could argue that like uh that that's the. job of the AI like the AI should just. tell them when take the medicine and. they should take it and uh you know like. like by the way forgetful people exist.

already like even I'm pretty forgetful. myself. I'm not like um on top of. everything. Same. It's because your your. RAM is limited right now. I guess what. you're trying to say is like what the. next generation is going to load their. RAM with is going to look very different. from us. Um, and it's going to be. interesting to see like how they spend. their mental compute. If they if they. don't spend it at all and it's all just. like uh.

unutilized, that's sad. Yeah, that's. what I'm telling. I hope that's not. going to happen. if they have all that. um free capacity and they can spend it. on like more creative things that would. be amazing. and it's still like jewelry is still out. of what's going to happen but I'm hoping. like it's going to be the second yeah if. it happens like that like all with all. the free mental capacity that they have. if they increase their ability to work. on more complex problems it's going to.

be great but if it happens the other way. around which is which a lot of people. are worried about that's something I. deal is I don't know what's going to. happen then. Yeah. I mean it'll be bad. because because our um if. you if you like roll out multiple. generations after that like it's only. going to get worse. So we really need to. make sure like they are being thrown at. like hard problems and like you know. given all these tools and hey go figure. it out. Got it. Well perfect. Thank you.

so much for coming here. This was. awesome. By the way, I heard you're the. Joe Rogan of India. That's what someone. told me. Is that true? No, I am the Raj. Shamani of India. Let's just put it this. way. Cool. Awesome. Perfect. Thank you. so much for coming here. I really. enjoyed our chat. I have bunch of. questions for you, but maybe we'll the. time do it again and try to figure out. all the best for your India trip. Thank. you. Thank you. Thank you so much. I. read your one I think it was some.

interview some podcast or some like an. outcome of this and the thumbnail was. like I'm going to beat Google. Oh yeah. People make these thumbnails. That's why. I asked you this question. Do you go to. these meetings and be like hey I'm going. to beat I mean you're a YouTuber you. understand I do. Yeah. Thank you so much. for watching this podcast till the. end. Number two,

comments. And number. three, conversation is enough to change. someone's life. I'll see you next time. Until then, keep figuring out. [Music].