French artificial intelligence company Mistral has announced the completion of a 3 billion euro Series D funding round, pushing its post-money valuation to over 21 billion euros. The round was led by Samsung Electronics, with the capital earmarked for model development, computational power and infrastructure expansion, as well as international business growth. Mistral stated that this represents the largest equity financing ever completed by a European technology company.

The new funding for research and development, alongside corporate participation, was also co-led by the Scaleup Europe Fund, managed by EQT, and existing investor PSG Equity. Long-standing shareholders, including ASML and Nvidia, continued their participation in this round. With the fresh capital secured, Mistral plans to expand its frontier model research and increase the computational power needed for model training.

The company is simultaneously advancing its infrastructure build-out and commercial expansion, currently operating across 20 countries and serving over 125 global enterprises, with clients including Airbus, ASML, and HSBC. Control over enterprise data and systems is a key focus for Mistral in winning over clients. The company combines its open-weight models with computational power and deployment products, enabling customers to customize models and manage data, run operations, and audit systems within their own environments.

Industrial Firms Join the Investment Wave

Prior to Samsung's leadership in this round, Mistral's previous financing was spearheaded by semiconductor equipment manufacturer ASML. In September 2025, ASML announced a 1.3 billion euro investment in Mistral's Series C round, securing approximately 11% of shares based on the fully diluted share count at that time. The two parties also signed a long-term cooperation agreement, planning to explore the use of AI models across ASML's products, research and development, and operations.

This collaboration carries specific industrial objectives: ASML aims to leverage AI to enhance lithography system performance and help clients reduce time-to-market. The two parties have also raised the possibility of joint research initiatives, though these goals remain part of the cooperation plan and cannot be directly viewed as already-achieved results. Additionally, through its investment, ASML has secured a seat on Mistral's strategic committee, occupied by Chief Financial Officer Roger Dassen, who provides counsel on the company's future strategy and technical decisions. With Samsung joining the lead investors, Mistral's investor lineup has further extended into major electronics and semiconductor industry players.