AI Assistant Le Chat and French company Mistral AI, behind several basic models, are officially considered one The most promising technology startup in France yes It can be said that it is the only European company that can compete with Openai.
It is reportedly in the process of raising another round Valuation is $14 billionStarting from about $6 billion in June 2024, Mistral AI describes itself as “the world’s greenest and leading independent AI lab”, but remains not as well known as its biggest competitor.
“Go to download the chat, not made by openai, or something,” said French President Emmanuel Macron. In a TV interview Before the AI Action Summit held in Paris in February 2025.
What is Mistral AI?
Mistral AI, which provides an open source AI model, has raised a lot of money since its creation in 2023, and it ambitiously “put Frontier AI in the hands of everyone.” While this is not a direct poke from OpenAI, the slogan is designed to highlight the company’s openness with OpenAI’s usually closed approach.
Its alternative is chatgpt, chat assistant le chat is Available on iOS and Android. It’s achieved 1 million downloads Within two weeks after the mobile launch, it even downloaded the first place in France for free on the iOS App Store.
In July 2025, Mistral AI updated LE chat Put it closer to competitors’ new features of full-stack AI chatbots: A new “deep research” model, local multilingual reasoning and advanced image editing. This update also includes adding a project that allows users to group chats, documents, and ideas into a centralized space.
As of September 2025, there are also LE chats Be able to remember previous conversations With the introduction remember.
TechCrunch Events
San Francisco
|
October 27-29, 2025
This is the model suite of Mistral AI, which includes:
- Mistral Big 2major large language model replacement Mistral.
- Pixtral,,,,, Unveiled in 2024 As a Multi-model PixTral family.
- RefereeThis is its first family of reasoning models, launched in June 2025.
- Mistral Medium 3released in May 2025, guarantees efficiency without damaging performance and is best suited for coding and STEM tasks.
- VoxelMistral’s first open source AI audio model was released in July 2025.
- DevstralThis is an AI model for encoding and publicly available under the Apache 2.0 license, meaning it can be used commercially without restrictions.
- Codestralearlier code generated AI models, but its license prohibits commercial applications.
- “Les Ministraux”, a family of models Optimize edge devices For example, phone.
- Mistral Saba, Focus on Arabic.
In March 2025, the company Mistral OCR was introducedan optical character recognition (OCR) API that can turn any PDF into a text file to make AI models easier to ingest.
In June 2025, Mistral AI also released a Vibe encoding client. Mistral Codecompete with current people like Windsurf, Anysphere’s cursor and Github Copilot.
Who is the founder of Mistral AI?
The three founders of Mistral AI have backgrounds in AI research at large American tech companies, which has important businesses in Paris. CEO Arthur Mensch used to work at Google’s DeepMind, while CTO Timothée Lacroix and chief scientist Guillaume Lample are former Meta staff.
The co-created consultants also include Jean Charles Samuel Weaver (also a board member) and Charles Gorintin from health insurance startup Alan and former digital minister Cédric O Persevere dispute Due to his previous role.
Is the Mistral AI model open source?
Not everyone. Mistral AI distinguishes its Prime Minister’s model Weight Not available for commercial purposes, from its free model, it provides heavy access to the Apache 2.0 license.
Free models include research models such as Mistral Nemo, which was built in partnership with Nvidia, the startup Open source July 2024.
How does Mistral AI make money?
Although many of Mistral AI’s products are free or There is now a free layerand the chat also paid for the layer. Le Chat’s Pro is scheduled to launch in February 2025 and is priced at $14.99 per month.
On the purely B2B side, Mistral AI monetizes through APIs through usage-based pricing. Businesses can also license these models, and the company may also generate substantial revenue from its strategic partnerships, some of which emphasize During the Paris AI Summit.
However, overall, according to multiple sources, Mistral AI’s revenue is reportedly still in the eight-digit range.
Which partnerships have closed Mistral AI?
In 2024, Mistral AI reached an agreement with Microsoft that included a strategic partnership to distribute its AI models through Microsoft’s Azure platform and an investment of 15 million euros. Competition and Marketing Authority (CMA) in the UK End quickly Due to its small size, the transaction is not eligible for investigation. However, it also triggered some criticize In the EU.
January 2025, Mistral AI Signed a deal with news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP) Let the chat search AFP’s entire text archive date back to 1983.
Mistral AI also establishes strategic partnership with France army and Working Agent,,,,, Luxembourg,,,,, Transport giant CMAGerman Defense Technology Startup Hulls,,,,, IBM,,,,, orangeand Stellantis.
In May 2025, Mistral AI announced that it will participate in the creation of AI campus in ParisAs part of a joint venture with UAE investment firm MGX, NVIDIA and French state-owned investment bank bpifrance.
In June 2025, it was announced that starting in 2026, Mistral will launch a European platform dedicated to AI, powered by NVIDIA processors, Mistral Compute. This effect is Called “historic” by MacronShortly after the announcement, the stage was shared with Mensch and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang at a Vivatech conference.
In July 2025, it announced Citizens’ Artificial Intelligence“A collaborative initiative aims to help states and public institutions strategically leverage the AI of their people by changing public services, catalyzing innovation and ensuring competitiveness.”
Which enterprise features have developed Mistral AI?
In May 2025, Mistral AI released Mistral Agents API arrive “Enlightenment of businesses to use AI in a more practical and impactful way,” According to its developer relations director Sophia Yang.
In September 2025, the company Revealed Renovated Connector Directoryshowcases the integration of LE CHAT with approximately 20 enterprise tools including Asana, Atlassian, Box, Google Drive, Intion, Zapier, and email and calendar; soon, data links and snowflakes.
How much money has Mistral AI raised so far?
As of February 2025, Mistral AI has raised about 1 billion euros in capital so far, at the current exchange rate of US$1.04 billion. This includes some debt financing, as well as several rounds of consecutive rounds raised at close range.
In June 2023, even before the first model was released, Mistral AI proposed Record $112 million seed round Leaded by Lightspeed Venture Partners. Sources at the time said the seed round – The largest ever in Europe – The estimated price of a one-month-old startup at that time was $260 million.
Other investors in this type of sub-round include Bpifrance, Eric Scahmidt, Exor Ventures, First Minute Capital, Title, JC Decaux Holding, La Famiglia, Localglobe, Motier Ventures, Rodolphe Saadé, Sofina and Xavier Niel.
Just six months later, it closed Series A €385 million ($415 million at the time), reportedly valued at $2 billion. The round is led by Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z), with existing Backer Lightspeed as well as participation from BNP Paribas, CMA-CGM, Crivention, Elad Gil, General Catalyst and Salesforce.
this $16.3 million convertible investment The series produced in Mistral AI, which Microsoft has in February 2024, is a Series A extension, meaning the valuation remains unchanged.
In June 2024, Mistral AI was held later €600 million in stocks and debts (It was about US$640 million at the exchange rate at that time). this Long-term roul round Leaded by ordinary catalysts at a valuation of $6 billion, including well-known investors such as Cisco, IBM, NVIDIA, Samsung Ventures, etc.
According to Bloomberg, Mistral AI is now Finalize 2 billion euro investment Valuation in a currency of $14 billion. This is a previous report, the company is In talks to raise $1 billion Equity in investors including the MGX fund in Abu Dhabi and debt of hundreds of millions of euros. but
How does Mistral AI approach AI regulations?
Mensch is a member of a group of European CEOs sign July 2025 Urge Brussels “Stop the clock” Two years before the key obligations of the EU Artificial Intelligence Act came into effect. The European Commission is Stick to its original schedule.
What will Mistral AI export look like?
Mistral is “not for sale”, Mensch said at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2025. “certainly, [an IPO is] plan. ”
Given how much the startup has raised so far: Even large sales could offer investors a high enough multiple, not to mention the sovereignty issues of the acquirer.
But the only way to absolutely squeeze rumors of continued acquisitions – Name Apple – Extend its revenue to a level that can even justify its valuation. Either way, stay tuned.
This story was originally released on February 28, 2025 and will be updated regularly.
