Mistral bags €1.7BN funding round as ASML takes significant stake

Mistral, the French AI company, has bagged a €1.7bn funding round, more than doubling its valuation to around €11.7bn, in a funding round which sees the Dutch chip equipment firm ASML take a major stake in Mistral as part of a strategic partnership.

Mistral is seen as a French rival to the US frontier model companies like OpenAI and Anthropic and the funding comes at a time when massive funding rounds in frontier model companies show no signs of abating as companies battle for supremacy.

The funding round in Mistral also marks something of a victory for European tech sovereignty, as the EU looks to become less dependent on Silicon Valley. ASML ploughed €1.3bn into the funding round, with other investors in the round including existing investors Nvidia, DST Global, Andreessen Horowitz, Bpifrance, General Catalyst, Index Ventures and Lightspeed.

The new valuation of around €11.7 billion more than doubles Mistral’s previous €5.8bn valuation last year during its €600m funding round. The strategic partnership between Mistral and ASML, which now becomes Mistral's biggest shareholder owning 11 per cent, will see Mistral’s AI models leveraged across ASML’s portfolio as well as for research purposes.

According to Bloomberg, ASML is the producer of lithography equipment used by semiconductor equipment firms to make chips for products like Apple iPhones. Christophe Fouque, ASML CEO, said: “The collaboration between Mistral AI and ASML aims to generate clear benefits for ASML customers through innovative products and solutions enabled by AI, and will offer potential for joint research to address future opportunities. 

“We believe that this strategic partnership with Mistral AI, which goes beyond a traditional vendor-client relationship, is the best way to capture this significant opportunity. We also believe that this collaboration is value-enhancing to Mistral AI.” Arthur Mensch, Mistral CEO, said: “We're back to school! Very proud of our team accomplishments, and honored to partner with ASML in our next phase. We're very excited to push frontier AI capabilities in science and technology, with exciting releases ahead."