French artificial intelligence startup Mistral is in discussions with investors, including Abu Dhabi’s MGX and several venture capital firms, to raise $1 billion at a $10 billion valuation, the Financial Times reported, citing sources familiar with the talks.
The funding round would support the commercial expansion of Mistral’s chatbot, Le Chat, and further development of its large language models. Mistral launched what it called Europe’s first AI reasoning model in June, designed to improve logical response generation as it competes with US and Chinese developers.
Mistral previously raised EUR 600 million in a Series B round in late 2023, bringing its valuation to EUR 5.8 billion. Existing backers include Nvidia, Andreessen Horowitz, and Lightspeed Venture Partners.
The latest fundraising effort comes as European AI firms seek to gain ground on US companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic, which have drawn multibillion-dollar support from Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. MGX, a tech investment platform backed by Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala, has increased exposure to AI and semiconductors as part of the UAE’s national AI strategy.
Mistral has yet to report significant revenue or widespread adoption but is seen as a key player in Europe’s bid to build sovereign AI capabilities.
