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Perplexity AI Offers Google $34.5 Bn for Chrome Browser 

A logo is pictured at Google's European Engineering Center in Zurich, Switzerland July 19, 2018. (Reuters)
A logo is pictured at Google's European Engineering Center in Zurich, Switzerland July 19, 2018. (Reuters)
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Perplexity AI Offers Google $34.5 Bn for Chrome Browser 

A logo is pictured at Google's European Engineering Center in Zurich, Switzerland July 19, 2018. (Reuters)
A logo is pictured at Google's European Engineering Center in Zurich, Switzerland July 19, 2018. (Reuters)

Perplexity AI offered Google on Tuesday $34.5 billion for its popular Chrome web browser, which the internet giant could potentially be forced to sell as part of antitrust proceedings.

The whopping sum proposed in a letter of intent by Perplexity is nearly double the value of the startup, which was reportedly $18 billion in a recent funding round.

"This proposal is designed to satisfy an antitrust remedy in highest public interest by placing Chrome with a capable, independent operator focused on continuity, openness, and consumer protection," Perplexity chief executive Aravind Srinivas said in the letter, a copy of which was seen by AFP.

Google is awaiting US District Court Judge Amit Mehta's ruling on what "remedies" to impose, following a landmark decision last year that said the tech titan maintained an illegal monopoly in online search.

US government attorneys have called for Google to divest itself of the Chrome browser, contending that artificial intelligence is poised to ramp up the tech giant's dominance as the go-to window into the internet.

Google has urged Mehta to reject the divestment, and his decision is expected by the end of the month.

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Perplexity's offer vastly undervalues Chrome and "should not be taken seriously," Baird Equity Research analysts said in a note to investors.

Given that Perplexity already has a browser that competes with Chrome, the San Francisco-based startup could be trying to spark others to bid or "influence the pending decision" in the antitrust case, Baird analysts theorized.

"Either way, we believe Perplexity would view an independent Chrome -- or one no longer affiliated with Google -- as an advantage as it attempts to take browser share," Baird analysts told investors.

Google contends that the United States has gone way beyond the scope of the suit by recommending a spinoff of Chrome, and holding open the option to force a sale of its Android mobile operating system.

"Forcing the sale of Chrome or banning default agreements wouldn't foster competition," said Cato Institute senior fellow in technology policy Jennifer Huddleston.

"It would hobble innovation, hurt smaller players, and leave users with worse products."

Google attorney John Schmidtlein noted in court that more than 80 percent of Chrome users are outside the United States, meaning divestiture would have global ramifications.

"Any divested Chrome would be a shadow of the current Chrome," he contended.

"And once we are in that world, I don't see how you can say anybody is better off."

The potential of Chrome being weakened or spun off comes as rivals such as Microsoft, ChatGPT and Perplexity put generative artificial intelligence (AI) to work fetching information from the internet in response to user queries.

Google is among the tech companies investing heavily to be a leader in AI, and is weaving the technology into search and other online offerings.

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Technology

Tesla Invites Select Customers to Buy Cybercab for Personal Use

A passenger waves from a Tesla Cybercab driverless taxi as it travels through downtown Austin, Texas, US, October 27, 2026. (Reuters)
A passenger waves from a Tesla Cybercab driverless taxi as it travels through downtown Austin, Texas, US, October 27, 2026. (Reuters)
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Tesla Invites Select Customers to Buy Cybercab for Personal Use

A passenger waves from a Tesla Cybercab driverless taxi as it travels through downtown Austin, Texas, US, October 27, 2026. (Reuters)
A passenger waves from a Tesla Cybercab driverless taxi as it travels through downtown Austin, Texas, US, October 27, 2026. (Reuters)

Tesla said on Friday it was inviting select customers to buy the Cybercab for personal use, marking a push towards delivering fully designed autonomous vehicles to customers.

Tesla posted the announcement on X ‌with an ‌image of the golden butterfly door ‌two-seater, ⁠priced at $29,990 with ⁠an “Autonomy Subscription” of $299 a month.

Chief Executive Elon Musk said in a post on X that the offering would be available nationwide as Tesla receives regulatory approval.

"The monthly fee is too ⁠high," Musk said, adding that ‌it should match the ‌cost of Tesla Full Self Driving and connectivity ‌for other models, which is about $115 ‌per month.

The EV maker aims to start selling its Cybercab robotaxis to the public by the end of this year, ‌Lars Moravy, Tesla's vice president of vehicle engineering, said last month.

The ⁠Cybercab will work unsupervised in all the same geo locations as the robotaxi, Tesla’s head of artificial intelligence, Ashok Elluswamy, said in a separate X post.

Tesla launched its unsupervised robotaxi service in Austin, Texas, in June 2025, expanded the offering to Dallas and Houston in April 2026 and rolled it out in Miami in July 2026.

Technology

Microsoft Says All Services Restored After Global Outage

A view shows a Microsoft logo at Microsoft offices in Issy-les-Moulineaux near Paris, France, January 9, 2025. (Reuters)
A view shows a Microsoft logo at Microsoft offices in Issy-les-Moulineaux near Paris, France, January 9, 2025. (Reuters)
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Microsoft Says All Services Restored After Global Outage

A view shows a Microsoft logo at Microsoft offices in Issy-les-Moulineaux near Paris, France, January 9, 2025. (Reuters)
A view shows a Microsoft logo at Microsoft offices in Issy-les-Moulineaux near Paris, France, January 9, 2025. (Reuters)

Microsoft said on Saturday that services had fully recovered across Teams, Outlook and its other products, ending a global outage that crippled online communications for businesses and governments for over 24 hours. 

"We have completed our efforts to address the underlying issue of the incident and restored service to the remaining impacted customers and regions," the company posted on X. 

Microsoft had said server issues were behind the incident that also affected its Copilot AI assistant, and that it was not aware of any malicious activity, ruling out AI as the cause. 

Outlook and Teams are two of the most widely used workplace applications with hundreds of millions of users. The outage prevented people from performing essential functions such as sending emails, managing calendars and hosting virtual meetings. 

It affected government agencies from Australia and Japan to the United States, caused delays at trading firms, hindered some companies from publishing earnings and prompted airlines to warn customers of communication lags, according to public statements. 

Organizations that host Microsoft services on ‌their own servers, rather than ‌in the cloud, were somewhat spared. 

ANOTHER OUTAGE FOR MICROSOFT 

The outage, reports of which started climbing around ‌1725 GMT on ⁠Thursday according to ⁠Ookla, is one of the longest in Microsoft's history and the second disruption to its services this year. 

Microsoft said the outage specifically hit features tied to Exchange Online — its cloud-based email and scheduling hub — leaving unconnected applications operational. 

The incident deepens questions about the global reliance on a handful of Big Tech companies that supply both the essential software and the cloud infrastructure that underpins it. 

It also highlighted the dependence on Microsoft's workplace software, with outage reports spiking as employees began their workdays across Asia and Europe, according to Downdetector's parent company, Ookla. 

Downdetector logged more than 7.4 million reports worldwide, peaking at nearly 20,000 a minute, more than 1,500 times normal levels. 

"It shows how much of the working day now runs through one provider's email and collaboration tools," said Luke Kehoe, lead industry analyst at Ookla. 

Microsoft shares closed flat at $523.88 on Friday. The stock has ⁠gained roughly 8% so far this year. 

Disruptions and financial losses from the outage could result in numerous insurance claims, ‌but the overall hit to insurers is expected to be limited, said Mario De Cicco, vice president ‌of European financial institutions at Morningstar DBRS. 

De Cicco estimated global insured losses from the incident at between $300 million and $500 million, well below the $400 million to $1.5 billion financial toll from the ‌2024 CrowdStrike outage that crashed more than 8 million Windows-based computers and caused widespread disruptions. 

Microsoft also faced an outage with its 365 services in January this ‌year and in October last year. Last month, it reported an outage of its Azure cloud platform that impacted its suite of productivity software and a range of industries worldwide. 

"The bigger worry is that this is not the first Microsoft 365 outage this year," said Josh Gilbert, a market analyst at trading platform eToro. 

"If reliability starts to look like a recurring problem, it hands every IT department a reason to think twice before putting even more of their business in one provider's hands." 

Still, some analysts have questioned whether such ‌incidents can push customers on to rivals due to the steep switching costs of replacing tools embedded so deeply in daily operations. 

TRADES HAD TO BE CONFIRMED BY FAX 

A spokesperson for the UK government said it was ⁠working with Microsoft to find a solution ⁠for the outage that hit organizations such as the NHS and London's Metropolitan Police. 

Lack of access to emails and other services was impacting the Metropolitan Police's ability to report some crimes online, though its ability to respond to calls was not affected. 

The NHS said its local services were turning to alternate measures such as using IT systems or paper records. 

For businesses, the fallout was widespread. 

European exchange operator Euronext reported email disruptions, British insurer Aviva activated backups for its earnings calls and Danish shipping giant Maersk warned customers of delayed updates. 

American AI giants OpenAI and Anthropic also faced issues with Microsoft connectors that were later resolved, while Indian airlines IndiGo, Akasa Air and Air India said their email support services were impacted. 

The outage also disrupted fund management at Taiwanese securities firms, life insurers, and investment trust companies. One of the companies went as far as cancelling a bond repurchase transaction, a source familiar with the situation told Reuters. 

Another Taiwanese financial company resorted to using fax to confirm trades, a second source said. 

In the US, electric truck maker Workhorse Group rescheduled its results on Thursday to November 16, while Switzerland's Richemont briefly delayed its first-half results announcement on Friday. 

In Australia, where the spy agency and federal police were among organizations caught in the outage, Cyber Security Minister Tony Burke said Microsoft does not suspect a cyberattack. 

Technology

Hours-Long Microsoft Outage Disrupts Businesses, Governments Globally

This illustration photograph shows the Microsoft Outlook logo (C) displayed on a smartphone with the backdrop of Microsoft logo on a screen, in New Delhi on November 13, 2026. (AFP)
This illustration photograph shows the Microsoft Outlook logo (C) displayed on a smartphone with the backdrop of Microsoft logo on a screen, in New Delhi on November 13, 2026. (AFP)
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Hours-Long Microsoft Outage Disrupts Businesses, Governments Globally

This illustration photograph shows the Microsoft Outlook logo (C) displayed on a smartphone with the backdrop of Microsoft logo on a screen, in New Delhi on November 13, 2026. (AFP)
This illustration photograph shows the Microsoft Outlook logo (C) displayed on a smartphone with the backdrop of Microsoft logo on a screen, in New Delhi on November 13, 2026. (AFP)

A more than 12-hour outage of Microsoft Outlook and Teams crippled communications for businesses and governments globally on Friday, forcing some organizations to revert to fax machines and halting at least one bond repurchase in Europe.

Microsoft said server issues were behind the incident that also affected its Copilot AI assistant and that a broader roll-out of software fixes was starting to stabilize the system. It said it was not aware of any malicious activity.

Outlook and Teams are two of the most widely used workplace applications with hundreds of millions of users. The outage prevented people from performing essential functions such as sending emails, managing calendars and hosting virtual meetings.

It affected government agencies from Australia to Japan and the United States, caused delays at trading firms, hindered some companies from publishing earnings and prompted airlines to warn customers of communication lags, according to public statements.

Organizations that host Microsoft services ‌on their own servers, ‌rather than in the cloud, were somewhat spared.

ANOTHER OUTAGE FOR MICROSOFT

The outage is one of ‌the ⁠longest in Microsoft's ⁠history and the second disruption to its services this year.

Microsoft said the outage specifically hit features tied to Exchange Online - its cloud-based email and scheduling hub - leaving unconnected applications operational.

The incident deepens questions about the global reliance on a handful of Big Tech companies that supply both the essential software and the cloud infrastructure that underpins it.

Microsoft shares were down 0.4% in early trading. They have gained roughly 8% so far this year.

Disruptions and financial losses from the outage could result in numerous insurance claims, but the overall hit to insurers is expected to be limited, said Mario De Cicco, vice president of European financial institutions at Morningstar DBRS.

De Cicco estimated global insured losses from the incident at between $300 million and $500 million, well below ⁠the $400 million to $1.5 billion financial toll from the 2024 CrowdStrike outage that crashed more than 8 million ‌Windows-based computers and caused widespread disruptions.

Microsoft also faced an outage with its 365 services in January ‌this year and in October last year. Last month, it reported an outage of its Azure cloud platform that impacted its suite of productivity software, ‌and a range of industries worldwide.

"The bigger worry is that this is not the first Microsoft 365 outage this year," said Josh ‌Gilbert, a market analyst at trading platform eToro.

"If reliability starts to look like a recurring problem, it hands every IT department a reason to think twice before putting even more of their business in one provider’s hands."

Still, some analysts have questioned whether such incidents can push customers on to rivals due to the steep switching costs of replacing tools embedded so deeply in daily operations.

TRADES HAD TO BE CONFIRMED BY FAX

A spokesperson for the UK government said ‌it was working with Microsoft to find a solution for the outage that hit organizations such as the NHS and London’s Metropolitan Police.

Lack of access emails and other services was impacting ⁠the Metropolitan Police's ability to report some ⁠crimes online, though its ability to respond to calls was not affected.

NHS said its local services were turning to alternate measures such as using IT systems or paper records.

For businesses, the fallout was widespread.

European exchange operator Euronext reported email disruptions, British insurer Aviva activated backups for its earnings calls and Danish shipping giant Maersk warned customers of delayed updates.

American AI giants OpenAI and Anthropic also faced issues with Microsoft connectors, while Indian airlines IndiGo, Akasa Air and Air India said their email support services were impacted.

The outage also disrupted fund management at Taiwanese securities firms, life insurers, and investment trust companies. One of the companies went as far as cancelling a bond repurchase transaction, a source familiar with the situation told Reuters.

Another Taiwanese financial company resorted to using fax to confirm trades, a second source said.

In the US, electric truck maker Workhorse Group rescheduled its results on Thursday to November 16, while Switzerland's Richemont briefly delayed its first-half results announcement on Friday.

In Australia, where the spy agency and federal police were among organizations caught in the outage, Cyber Security Minister Tony Burke said Microsoft does not suspect a cyber attack.

"The impact that they are dealing with ... is very much on email systems," the minister added.