"Opt for Mistral's Le Chat over OpenAI's ChatGPT!" On the eve of the 2025 Paris AI Action Summit in February, French President Macron lent his personal support to the homegrown AI assistant during a televised interview.

While government officials backing tech products is not unprecedented, this move underscores Europe's pressing ambition not to lag behind the U.S. in the AI competition. Mistral AI, a French startup established in 2023, is emerging as Europe's most promising AI newcomer.

On September 7, insiders informed Reuters that ASML, a pivotal supplier of cutting-edge chipmaking equipment, is set to become the largest stakeholder in the French AI startup Mistral AI, with the aim of bolstering Europe's technological autonomy.

01 Three Titans Unite: European AI's New Hope with a U.S. Tech Giant Pedigree

All three co-founders of Mistral AI hail from the Paris research divisions of U.S. tech giants. CEO Arthur Mensch is an alumnus of Google DeepMind, while CTO Timothée Lacroix and Chief Scientist Guillaume Lample previously worked at Meta.

This blend of U.S. tech giant expertise and European research acumen endows the company with distinct advantages: elite AI R&D prowess paired with an in-depth grasp of the European market landscape. Just a month after its inception, the company secured a record-breaking $112 million seed round at a valuation of $260 million, setting a new European benchmark.

The company's mission is to "democratize cutting-edge AI," a mantra that sharply contrasts with OpenAI's relatively closed approach and underscores its commitment to open-source principles.

02 Le Chat's Ascent: Mobile Assistant Surpasses 1 Million Downloads

In 2025, Mistral unveiled its ChatGPT rival, the Le Chat chat assistant, available on both iOS and Android platforms. The mobile version amassed 1 million downloads within two weeks of its launch, even claiming the top spot on France's iOS App Store free download chart.

Le Chat boasts multilingual reasoning capabilities and advanced image editing features. In September 2025, it introduced a "Memory" function to recall past conversations. Its "Deep Research" mode and "Projects" management tool enable users to organize chats, documents, and ideas into dedicated spaces.

Le Chat offers both free and premium versions, with the Pro plan priced at $14.99 per month, forming one of Mistral's revenue streams alongside enterprise-grade APIs.

03 Model Ecosystem: Comprehensive Capabilities from Open Source to Multimodal

Mistral AI has constructed a holistic model ecosystem:

Mistral Large 2: Its flagship large language model

Pixtral Large: A multimodal model launched in 2024

Magistral: The inaugural reasoning model family unveiled in June 2025

Voxtral: The first open-source AI audio model released in July 2025

Devstral: A programming model licensed under Apache 2.0 for unlimited commercial use

The company has also developed "Les Ministraux" models tailored for edge devices and Mistral Saba, which focuses on Arabic. In March 2025, it introduced the Mistral OCR API to convert PDFs into text for AI model processing.

04 Strategic Alliances: Broad Collaborations from Microsoft to the French Military

Mistral AI's roster of partners is impressive. In 2024, it forged a strategic partnership with Microsoft to distribute its AI models via Azure and secured a €15 million investment.

Since then, the company has established strategic collaborations with AFP, the French military, employment agencies, the Luxembourg government, shipping giant CMA, German defense tech startup Helsing, IBM, Orange, and Stellantis.

In May 2025, Mistral announced its involvement in creating the Paris Region AI Campus, forming a joint venture with UAE investment firm MGX, NVIDIA, and French state investment bank Bpifrance.

In 2026, Mistral is set to launch Mistral Compute, a European AI platform powered by NVIDIA processors, an initiative hailed as "historic" by Macron.

05 Business Strategy: Balancing Enterprise Services with Open Source

While offering free tiers for many of its products, Mistral generates revenue through Le Chat Pro ($14.99 per month) and enterprise APIs. Companies can opt for pay-per-use or license its top-tier models.

Multiple sources indicate that Mistral's revenue remains in the eight-figure range (tens of millions of dollars), still trailing its lofty valuation. This may explain why the company is seeking additional funding.

Reports suggest that Mistral is finalizing a €2 billion investment that will value the company at $14 billion post-money, more than doubling its $6 billion valuation from June 2024.

06 Regulatory Position: Urging the EU to Postpone AI Act Enforcement

In July 2025, Mensch co-signed an open letter with other European CEOs, urging Brussels to "pause for two years" before enforcing key provisions of the EU AI Act. However, the European Commission has maintained its original timeline.

This stance highlights the regulatory challenges European AI companies face, as they strive to balance compliance with innovation.

At the January 2025 Davos World Economic Forum, Mensch explicitly stated that Mistral is "not for sale," with an IPO as the planned exit strategy. Given its funding scale and valuation, a major acquisition might not yield sufficiently high return multiples for investors, not to mention potential sovereignty concerns.

However, to fully dispel acquisition rumors (recently involving Apple), Mistral needs to boost its revenue to justify its valuation. Whatever path it chooses, this European AI champion will continue to command global attention.

Can Europe Reverse the Tide in the AI Race? Mistral AI is Emerging as the Crucial Test Case for This Proposition.