Samsung to take equity stake in Mistral AI, jointly develop AI model
Under the agreement, the two will combine chip design and manufacturing data from Samsung's Device Solutions division with Mistral's large language models to build an AI model optimized for semiconductor work.
Samsung Electronics Executive Chairman Lee Jae-yong, right, speaks with Mistral AI CEO Arthur Mensch during a luncheon welcoming French President Emmanuel Macron on his state visit to Korea at the Blue House guesthouse in Jongno District, central Seoul, on April 3.NEWS1
Samsung Electronics will take an equity stake in French AI firm Mistral AI and jointly develop an AI model specialized for semiconductor design and manufacturing, the company said on Tuesday.
Samsung said that it signed a strategic partnership with Mistral AI that same day. Under the agreement, the two companies will combine chip design and manufacturing data from Samsung’s Device Solutions (DS) division with Mistral’s large language models (LLM) to build an AI model optimized for semiconductor work.
Separately, Mistral AI said that it raised 3 billion euros ($3.5 billion) in the most recent funding round, with Samsung leading the investment. The Scaleup Europe Fund, managed by Swedish investment firm EQT and backed by the European Commission to bolster European tech firms,and existing investor PSG Equity joined as co-investors.
The 3 billion euros represent the full size of the funding round; Samsung did not disclose how much it had actually invested or what stake it acquired.
Samsung plans to build its own AI system tailored to the DS division using Mistral’s LLMs. The company then intends to apply the system in stages to data analysis, defect prediction and process optimization to shorten chip development timelines and improve manufacturing efficiency and quality.
Given the many variables in a given process, using AI to identify a defect’s cause or optimal conditions can cut development time and raise the yield rate and production efficiency. That is why companies are looking to employ AI as more than a simple document-generating tool.
Central to the partnership is how the AI model will be run. The two companies will use an “on-premise” approach — operating the model on Samsung’s own internal servers and data centers rather than external cloud infrastructure — to keep sensitive data from leaving the company while it trains the AI model.
Korean President Lee Jae Myung, left, shakes hands with Mistral CEO Arthur Mensch, right, as French President Emmanuel Macron, center, looks on at the Élysée Palace in Paris on Sept. 8.AP/YONHAP
Founded in France in 2023, Mistral AI is a leading AI startup established by researchers formerly at Google DeepMind and Meta. It has developed its own LLMs, including Mistral Large and Mixtral, and built its business around on-premises AI for industries — such as finance, manufacturing and energy — that require high levels of security.
Samsung plans to expand the collaboration across the DS division as a whole, including memory, foundry and logic chip operations, and will jointly build an AI platform and operating system tailored to semiconductor work with Mistral.
If Mistral expands its AI infrastructure business in the future, further cooperation involving Samsung’s memory, logic and foundry businesses is possible.
Mistral AI is the latest global AI company that Samsung has partnered with in recent months. Samsung signed a strategic partnership with OpenAI in October of last year to join its large-scale AI infrastructure project, Stargate, as a memory partner, and joined Anthropic’s investment round in May.
The moves reflect what the company describes as “bidirectional cooperation,” or securing rising chip demand from AI companies while also applying their technology to Samsung’s own semiconductor research, development and manufacturing.
“As the complexity of chip design and manufacturing rapidly increases, the ability to safely and precisely harness vast amounts of data through AI is emerging as a core competitive advantage,” Jun Young-hyun, the vice chairman and head of Samsung Electronics’ DS division and Memory business, said. “Together with Mistral AI, we will build AI models and platforms specialized for the semiconductor industry and set a new standard for AI-driven innovation in chipmaking.”
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
