French artificial intelligence startup Mistral AI is reportedly in the early stages of discussions to raise approximately €3 billion ($3.5 billion), according to a Bloomberg report published Friday, citing people familiar with the matter.
If completed, the funding round would value the company at around €20 billion (roughly $23.15 billion), nearly doubling the €11.7 billion valuation Mistral secured in its Series C financing round last September.
Founded in 2023, Mistral has quickly emerged as one of Europe’s leading AI companies with a mission to make advanced AI technology more widely accessible. Unlike many of its American competitors, the company has adopted a more open approach by releasing several large language models with open weights, allowing developers and businesses to modify and customise them for their own applications.
Alongside its open models, Mistral also offers proprietary AI systems designed for specific use cases, including software development, voice generation and cloning, and optical character recognition.
As European governments and businesses increasingly seek alternatives to major U.S. technology providers, Mistral has positioned itself as a sovereign European AI company. The startup is building a data centre near Paris and has established partnerships with the French military, the government of Luxembourg, and several major European enterprises.
Despite its rapid rise, Mistral has raised only about $4 billion to date, according to PitchBook. That remains well below the funding secured by U.S. AI leaders such as OpenAI, which has raised approximately $186 billion, and Anthropic, which has attracted around $161.25 billion. Those companies also command significantly higher valuations, reflecting stronger revenue growth, broader adoption, and greater enterprise demand.
