Mistral tells French deputies it rebuffed acquisition offers and defended its independence and scale

Arthur Mensch used a French parliamentary hearing on May 12 to argue that Mistral should remain independent, expand its computing footprint in Europe and build enough infrastructure to compete with larger U.S. rivals. The Mistral co-founder and chief executive appeared before a National Assembly inquiry commission examining digital dependencies and risks to France’s independence, alongside Audrey Herblin-Stoop, the company’s head of public affairs and communications. The hearing came as Mistral has been pitching itself as a European alternative in generative AI and cybersecurity, including in discussions with banks about a model positioned against Anthropic’s restricted Mythos system. ### What did Mensch tell deputies about a sale of Mistral? Arthur Mensch told deputies that Mistral had received acquisition approaches and had turned them down, according to accounts of the May 12 hearing. The message matched remarks he made earlier this year that the company was “not for sale” and intended to preserve its independence, including through a possible public listing in the coming years. (youtube.com) The May 12 hearing took place before the National Assembly’s commission of inquiry on “structural dependencies and systemic vulnerabilities in the digital sector and the risks to France’s independence.” The framing mattered because Mensch presented AI as infrastructure rather than a software feature, linking ownership of models and computing capacity to national and European autonomy. (01net.com) ### Which numbers from the hearing stood out most? Mensch said Mistral would spend about €1 billion on research and development in 2026 and was aiming for 1 gigawatt of capacity by 2029, according to reporting based on the hearing. He also cited current clusters of about 40 megawatts in France and 25 megawatts in Sweden as part of that build-out. (questions.assemblee-nationale.fr) February reporting by the Financial Times, republished by Luxembourg Times, showed Mistral already moving in that direction. The company said then that it would invest €1.2 billion to build AI data centers in Sweden, its first such facility outside France, and that it was working with EcoDataCenter on a site expected to offer 23 megawatts of computing power. Arthur Mensch said at the time that Mistral was “diversifying and spreading” capacity across Europe. (01net.com) ### Why was France’s electricity mix part of the argument? France’s nuclear-heavy power system was part of Mensch’s case that Europe, and France in particular, has a structural advantage for AI infrastructure. A detailed review of the hearing said he described AI as an energy-conversion business in which electricity is turned into tokens, and argued that decarbonized, relatively cheap power matters for training and operating models. (luxtimes.lu) LCP’s coverage of the hearing said Mensch also warned deputies that AI deployment would sharply increase electricity demand and could create “conflicts of use” and inflation if supply does not keep up. That put energy policy and data-center capacity at the center of his testimony, not just model development. (angelo-lima.fr) ### What was the point of invoking Anthropic’s Mythos? Bloomberg reported on May 13 that Mistral was in discussions with European banks about deploying its own answer to Anthropic’s Mythos, a limited-access model designed to find cybersecurity vulnerabilities. Other coverage tied that effort directly to the parliamentary hearing, where Mensch argued that sensitive European sectors needed control over the AI systems they use. (lcp.fr) Some reports of the hearing said Mensch claimed Mistral had reached parity on parts of the vulnerability-finding work highlighted by Mythos. Public evidence for that claim remains limited in the sources available so far, but the broader context is clear: Anthropic restricted Mythos access, and European institutions and companies have been looking for domestic alternatives. (bloomberg.com) ### How does this fit with Mistral’s wider expansion? Mistral said in February that its annualized revenue run rate was above $400 million and that it was targeting more than $1 billion in annual recurring revenue by the end of 2026. The company also said readily available debt financing meant it did not need to list this year, even as it kept an eventual IPO under consideration. (01net.com) The next public marker is the National Assembly inquiry itself. The commission’s hearing page and video archive list the May 12 session with Arthur Mensch and Audrey Herblin-Stoop, and the broader parliamentary inquiry into France’s digital vulnerabilities is still taking testimony. (questions.assemblee-nationale.fr) (luxtimes.lu)