Mistral AI secures funding at $6B valuation; DST in, SoftBank abstains
Paris-based startup Mistral AI, focusing on open-source language models, is reportedly raising funds at a $6 billion valuation to compete with OpenAI and Anthropic, with DST, General Catalyst, and Lightspeed Venture Partners possibly investing.
The investment round is estimated to be almost $600 million, increasing considerably from Mistral's previous $2 billion valuation after a $415 million round.
Unlike SoftBank, which is not part of this deal, heavyweight investor DST has supported tech giants like Facebook and Alibaba and may join longstanding backers GC and LSVP.
Mistral, a young LLM player and a European AI hub member, aims for an open-source approach and has released three models since September 2023.
While SoftBank shows AI investment interest elsewhere, such as Wayve and potentially U.K. AI chip designer Graphcore, Mistral hasn't commented on the fundraising speculations.
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