French AI startup Mistral hits $13.8B valuation with $1.7B series C funding led by ASML, Nvidia among backers

Mistral AI, the Paris-based startup challenging OpenAI on its home turf, has secured a massive cash infusion that more than doubles its valuation. The two-year-old company just closed a €1.7 billion ($1.8 billion) Series C round led by Dutch chip giant ASML, pushing its valuation to €11.7 billion ($13.8 billion). Nvidia, Andreessen Horowitz, DST Global, Bpifrance, General Catalyst, Index Ventures, and Lightspeed returned as investors.

The deal cements ASML as one of Mistral’s largest shareholders with an 11% stake and marks what the Dutch firm called a “first-of-its-kind partnership.” ASML put €1.3 billion on the table, betting big on Europe’s most talked-about AI company at a time when the European Union is trying to carve out independence from Silicon Valley. ASML CFO Roger Dassen will also take a seat on Mistral’s strategic committee board, CNBC reported.

Europe’s AI Challenger: ASML Joins Nvidia in Backing Mistral AI’s $1.7B Raise

For Mistral, the raise is a giant leap from its €5.8 billion valuation last year, when it pulled in €600 million. The company is racing to build large language models that can stand toe-to-toe with U.S. rivals. Its open-source models and “Le Chat” chatbot, designed for European users, have already gained traction. Now it’s gearing up for its first reasoning model, described by CEO Arthur Mensch as “great at mathematics [and] great at coding,” aimed squarely at OpenAI and China’s DeepSeek.

Still, the gulf is wide. OpenAI’s $10.3 billion secondary sale earlier this year valued it at $500 billion—nearly 36 times Mistral’s size. Yet for a startup founded in 2023 by former DeepMind and Meta researchers Arthur Mensch, Guillaume Lample, and Timothee Lacroix, the pace of growth has been nothing short of remarkable.

ASML’s involvement gives Mistral something more than capital: strategic leverage. The Dutch company supplies the lithography machines that Samsung, Intel, and Apple use to manufacture advanced chips. By securing this alliance, Mistral gains a critical foothold in Europe’s semiconductor ecosystem, potentially reducing its reliance on U.S. suppliers at a time of heightened trade tensions under President Donald Trump’s administration.

The raise comes less than a week after Bloomberg reported that Mistral was finalizing a €2 billion round at a similar valuation, underscoring the feverish investor interest in AI infrastructure. Reuters had already flagged the funding before today’s confirmation, but the official numbers tell a story of acceleration. Mistral is now firmly on the map as one of Europe’s few AI startups with the war chest to take on the U.S. giants.

Mistral AI Team