Perplexity CEO: SMBs Could Drive the Next Economic Boom

<p>Perplexity Founder &amp; CEO Aravind Srinivas believes the next wave of American economic growth could come from smaller, AI-native businesses, not just the largest technology companies.</p><p>Perplexity, valued at ~$20B with more than $2B in reported funding and backing from NVIDIA, SoftBank, IVP, NEA, Accel, Jeff Bezos, and Elad Gil, has evolved from an AI answer engine into a platform for autonomous agents, research, and knowledge work.</p><p>I sat down with Aravind at Perplexity&#39;s new San Francisco headquarters to discuss the economics of AI, the future of entrepreneurship, and why agents could enable a generation of smaller, more profitable companies.</p><p>Aravind reveals that Perplexity&#39;s revenue is growing 5x year over year, enterprise adoption is accelerating, and one solopreneur is spending over $1M annually on Perplexity Computer while generating $3M in annual revenue.</p><p>We also explore Perplexity&#39;s bet on local AI, its work with NVIDIA and Apple, and why the company has no plans to build its own data centers despite the massive infrastructure buildout underway.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Aravind Srinivas: </strong><a href="https://x.com/AravSrinivas" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://x.com/AravSrinivas</a><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Molly O’Shea:</strong> <a href="https://x.com/MollySOShea" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://x.com/MollySOShea</a> </p><p><strong>Sourcery:</strong> ⁠<a href="https://x.com/sourceryy" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://x.com/sourceryy</a> <br></p><p><br></p><p>𝐄𝐏𝐈𝐒𝐎𝐃𝐄 𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐊</p><p>YouTube: <a href="https://youtu.be/1C8_n9nnx5Y" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://youtu.be/1C8_n9nnx5Y</a></p><p><br></p><p>𝐒𝐏𝐎𝐍𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐒</p><p>• <a href="https://brex.com/sourcery" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer"><strong>Brex</strong></a>—The modern finance platform, combining the world’s smartest corporate card with integrated expense management, banking, bill pay, &amp; travel. <a href="https://brex.com/sourcery" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://brex.com/sourcery</a> </p><p>• <a href="http://www.harvey.ai?utm_medium=paid-partner&utm_source=sourcery&utm_campaign=2026-10-brand-sourcery-partnership" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer"><strong>Harvey</strong></a>—The AI platform built for legal work, is helping the best firms and companies close deals faster. More than 200,000 lawyers,