▲ Arthur Mensch, CEO of Mistral AI
French artificial intelligence (AI) startup Mistral announced on the 8th (local time) that it has secured 3 billion euros (approximately 4.7 trillion won) in a new funding round led by Samsung Electronics.
AFP and the Financial Times (FT) reported that the funding round was led by Samsung Electronics, with participation from the EU Scaleup Europe Fund managed by private equity firm EQT, as well as PSG Equity.
The 3 billion euros is the largest amount ever raised by a European tech company.
As a result, Mistral's valuation has surpassed 21 billion euros (approximately 32.8 trillion won), nearly doubling from 12 billion euros a year ago.
Founded in 2023, the startup Mistral has been considered Europe's challenger in the global tech market dominated by U.S. and Chinese companies.
However, it remains much smaller in scale compared to OpenAI, which is valued at 850 billion dollars (approximately 1,143 trillion won), or Anthropic, which is eyeing an initial public offering (IPO) at a valuation of 2 trillion dollars (approximately 2,689 trillion won).
Mistral stated that it will use the new funding to accelerate research and development (R&D) and pursue global expansion.
The company also announced plans to pursue a strategy of solidifying its niche by providing models that enterprises can operate directly using their own data.
Co-founder and CEO Arthur Mensch said in a statement, "This funding round enables us to move even faster on R&D, products, and infrastructure, and to continue delivering the ability for enterprises and institutions to run AI the way and at the scale they want."
Mensch also explained, "Institutions want to industrialize AI within their already complex systems with their own data, their own tools, and their own compliance constraints."
Since the beginning of this year, Mistral has been increasing infrastructure spending, including its first data center to be established in France.
In July, it signed an agreement with Microsoft (MS) to provide AI computing power and offer Mistral models to MS customers.
Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Johan Bergqvist told AFP regarding the funding round, "We have proven that we can build alternative models that are more cost-effective than our competitors, and our capital requirements are not as large as some of our peers."
He added that while expanding its footprint across Europe, the company is also seeing growing demand in the Middle East, Asia, and North America.
(Photo: Getty Images)
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