Samsung is in talks to invest in Mistral at a valuation of roughly €20 billion, the Financial Times reported on July 22, citing people familiar with the discussions. The FT's lead figure is "hundreds of millions of euros," with the upper end of the talks reported at about €1 billion.
A valuation that nearly doubles
Mistral was last valued at about €11.7-12 billion in a €1.7 billion Series C led by ASML in September 2025. A €20 billion mark would be roughly double that in under a year. Samsung is already an investor through its venture arm; this round would deepen the relationship considerably.
Who else is at the table
The FT reports that EQT's Scaleup Europe Fund — a Brussels-backed, EQT-managed vehicle — is also in talks, alongside Novo Holdings and Santander. Reuters, picking up the report, noted it could not independently verify it. Mistral declined to comment; Samsung did not respond to a request for comment.
One day after Microsoft
The report landed a day after Microsoft agreed to spend billions renting Mistral's European compute capacity and to distribute its models through Foundry and Copilot Studio. Together the two stories describe a company converting European sovereignty anxiety into both a customer base and a capital base. Mistral already supplies the French military and positions itself as the continent's alternative to US labs.
Still a fraction of its US rivals
Even at €20 billion, Mistral remains dwarfed by American peers. Reuters framed the urgency plainly: a US decision last month paused foreign access to two advanced models from a San Francisco lab — a reminder to European buyers of what dependence costs.