Perplexity's annualized revenue tripled in eight months, and one agent product did it

Both ends of that ratio are run rates rather than collected cash: under $250M annualized at the start of the year, above $750M annualized now, per the reporting ^[1][2]. The window is short even on the sources' own clock. Benzinga's write-up dates the baseline to the beginning of the year, treats September 2025 as last year, and refers back to a June interview in the past tense ^[1][14], which leaves roughly eight months between the two readings ^[20]. The chain there is Benzinga citing Reuters citing The Information, on a page Benzinga says was partly produced with AI tools ^[7][21].

What sits inside those eight months is a product line, not a traffic curve. TFN credits the surge largely to Perplexity Computer, a cloud agent that automates multi-step professional tasks ^[3][5]; Benzinga attributes the growth partly to the same thing, described as automating computer-based tasks for professional users ^[4]. The line being repriced is task completion. The answer-generation business it grew out of is not what changed.

Nvidia's route in reads the same way. Per The Information, it weighed licensing Perplexity's technology and hiring some of its staff before the conversation became a straight equity stake ^[16], which by TFN's read keeps it next to a customer that both burns GPU compute and generates the usage data that shapes what chips get built ^[19]. Nvidia's NVentures also backed Exa's $85M Series B at a $700M valuation in 2025, and Exa priced a $250M Series C at $2.2B in May 2026 ^[17]. Two names in agent-search infrastructure repriced inside a year, and Nvidia has money in both.

Whether Perplexity is the layer agents run on, or the best-funded entrant in a category still being defined, is the part TFN says a $30 billion price does not settle ^[18].