TL;DR

AI search startup Perplexity has signed a $750 million, three-year agreement with Microsoft to use its Azure cloud service. The deal provides access to AI models from OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI through Microsoft’s Foundry programme.

Multi-Model Access

The Nvidia-backed startup will run a range of AI models through Microsoft’s Foundry programme, giving it access to frontier systems from multiple providers rather than relying on a single vendor.

“Perplexity has chosen Microsoft Foundry as its primary AI platform for model sourcing under a new multi-year agreement,” a Microsoft spokesperson confirmed.

A Perplexity spokesperson said the company was partnering with Microsoft “for access to frontier models from X, OpenAI and Anthropic.”

Not Replacing AWS

Notably, Perplexity stated that it has not shifted spending from Amazon Web Services, its main cloud provider, as part of the Microsoft deal. The arrangement appears to complement rather than replace its existing infrastructure.

Complex Competitive Dynamics

The deal comes amid ongoing legal tensions between Perplexity and Amazon. Last year, Amazon sued the startup over its “agentic” shopping feature, which uses automation to place orders for users. Amazon alleged Perplexity covertly accessed customer accounts and disguised automated activity as human browsing.

The $750 million commitment represents a significant infrastructure investment for the AI search company, which has positioned itself as a challenger to traditional search engines by providing direct answers with cited sources.