Samsung Electronics and Naver have jointly entered the European sovereign artificial intelligence (AI) market through the French company MistralAI. This move is seen as a significant addition to the global AI competition, traditionally dominated by the U.S. and China, with South Korean companies establishing a third pillar centered in Europe.
According to the IT industry on September 9, Samsung Electronics and Naver Cloud formed a partnership with MistralAI during a Korea-France business roundtable held at the Élysée Palace in Paris on September 8.
Samsung Electronics signed an investment agreement with MistralAI under the name of Vice President Lee Jong-myung, while Naver agreed to explore joint global market entry strategies based on their partnership targeting the sovereign AI market.
The investment led by Samsung Electronics is part of MistralAI's Series D funding round, raising €3 billion (approximately 4.7 trillion won). This is the largest equity investment ever secured by a European tech company, pushing MistralAI's valuation beyond €21 billion (about 33 trillion won). Samsung led the round in collaboration with the EU's ScaleUp Europe Fund and existing investor PSG Equity, with new investors Advent and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg joining, while ASML, NVIDIA, and Salesforce Ventures participated as existing investors.
Samsung's investment goes beyond mere equity acquisition. MistralAI is expanding its business scope beyond model and inference services to include its own computing infrastructure. As a supplier of semiconductors and memory, Samsung stands to benefit directly as demand for AI infrastructure in Europe grows. Analysts in the investment banking sector suggest that this round is more of a strategic investment aimed at securing semiconductor demand due to the expansion of AI infrastructure in Europe rather than just a financial investment.
Naver's approach differs from that of Samsung. Naver Cloud had already established a comprehensive partnership with MistralAI in the manufacturing AI sector on July 8. This recent agreement extends their collaboration beyond manufacturing to encompass the entire global sovereign AI business. MistralAI has built a strong reference base with major European manufacturers such as Airbus, BMW, and ASML, and Naver plans to integrate its cloud infrastructure with these references to achieve success in domestic manufacturing before expanding into global markets.
When viewed together, the two agreements reveal a dual-track strategy for South Korean companies entering Europe, focusing on capital and business. Samsung's strategy involves securing access to MistralAI's growth and semiconductor demand through equity investment, while Naver aims to transplant proven industrial AI use cases validated in Europe into domestic and international markets through cloud and infrastructure collaboration. This structure allows for simultaneous entry into the European market through different axes of semiconductor hardware and cloud software with the same partner.
MistralAI is recognized as a leading independent supplier representing Europe in the AI model market, which has been dominated by U.S. tech giants like OpenAI and Google, as well as Chinese companies like Alibaba. With Samsung and Naver combining their capital and business interests with MistralAI, South Korea is positioning itself to expand its own collaborative axis outside the U.S.-China-centric AI competition, leveraging its semiconductor and infrastructure competitiveness.
Lee Jong-ho, a professor at Seoul National University and former Minister of Science and ICT, stated, “It is very appropriate for South Korea to collaborate with a leading European company to effectively compete in the AI sector without necessarily excluding or countering the U.S. and China. The important thing is to establish a third-tier AI capability.”
* This article has been translated by AI.
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