Published September 8th, 2026 - 11:29 GMT
ALBAWABA - Mistral, a French AI firm, raised three billion euros ($3.48 billion) in what has been called the largest-ever European tech fundraising – leaving the company valued at 21 billion euros ($24 billion).The European firm’s funding round led by chip giant Samsung, Dutch firm ASML having led the previous funding round, would accelerate its research and help it to expand internationally.While small, Mistral is Europe’s leading AI model developer, and is seemingly on its way to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the U.S.’s Anthropic and OpenAI.Mistral, aware of their status as an upstart company, is attempting to win clients by offering them models they can run themselves with their own data."This round means we can move faster on R&D, products, infrastructure and keep giving organizations the ability to run AI at scale, on their own terms," Mistral's chief executive and co-founder Arthur Mensch said in a statement.Lian Jye Su, an analyst at the technology research group Omdia said: "For Mistral to compete with its larger rivals, it will need more advanced technologies and business models,"Su added, describing the AI lab as "by far the best alternative outside of China and the US".
