Samsung is in talks to invest in Mistral, and the valuation may reach €20 billion

Deep Tide TechFlow message: On July 22, the Financial Times reported in the UK that insiders said Samsung is in talks to participate in a new round of funding for the AI startup Mistral. The round could bring Mistral’s valuation to about €20 billion. The move would help the French company become a major alternative to US technology giants.

One insider said Samsung previously supported the company through its venture capital arm, and this time could invest about €1 billion in the new round. The talks reflect that AI developers are broadly seeking partnerships with semiconductor suppliers to cope with a situation in which industry computing power demand far exceeds supply. After the Trump administration last month banned foreign users from accessing Anthropic’s latest Mythos and Fable models, interest from European and Asian companies and governments in alternatives to US-leading AI models has been rising.

Since its founding, Mistral has focused on developing open-source AI models, allowing customers to customize and control them—meaning any company or government cannot shut these models down.