In this episode of FYI, ARK’s Brett Winton and Charlie Roberts speak with Dmitry Shevelenko, Chief Business Officer at Perplexity, about the company’s evolving role in the future of the agentic internet. They discuss how Perplexity is carving out its place in the AI ecosystem—not as just a wrapper, but as a full-stack answer engine built for research, action, and trust. Dmitry outlines how Perplexity balances product excellence, model orchestration, and subscription alignment to serve both consumers and enterprises. He also highlights the team’s bold vision for Comet, their AI-native web browser, and how it fits into a future shaped by AI agents and voice interfaces.
Key Points From This Episode:
00:00:00 How Perplexity positions itself within the AI assistant landscape—and what makes it stand out to ARK.
00:02:37 Why the analyst team prefers Perplexity for researching earnings calls, transcripts, and filings.
00:03:58 Dmitry explains why only a few agentic AI systems may dominate—and why productization still matters.
00:06:10 The team discusses Perplexity's potential for rapid user growth and why context portability may remain limited.
00:07:51 How the agentic internet could reshape browsing—and why half of current screen time may be up for automation.
00:09:33 A breakdown of Perplexity’s monetization strategy, centered on consumer and enterprise subscriptions.
00:12:28 Why the company avoids ad-based business models in favor of long-term trust alignment with users.
00:13:1
|