AI start-up Perplexity offers \$34.5bn to acquire Google Chrome

AI start-up Perplexity has made a surprising \$34.5 billion (£25.6 billion) bid to acquire Google's Chrome browser. In a letter to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, Perplexity argued that moving Chrome to an independent operator focused on user safety would benefit the public. Google, which dominates the search engine and online advertising markets, is currently under intense scrutiny and facing a long-running antitrust case from the US Department of Justice. The BBC has reached out to Google for comment, but the company has not announced any plans to sell Chrome, which remains the world’s most popular web browser with over three billion users.