Arthur Mensch of Mistral AI, Jensen Huang CEO of Nvidia, on stage at Vivatechnology, in Paris, France on June 11, 2025. (Photo by AUGUSTIN PASQUINI/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)
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Arthur Mensch of Mistral AI, Jensen Huang CEO of Nvidia, on stage at Vivatechnology, in Paris, France on June 11, 2025. (Photo by AUGUSTIN PASQUINI/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images) Augustin Pasquini | Afp | Getty Images
Nvidia has become something of an AI kingmaker as hyperscalers rush to build out AI capacity. It's also got cash to burn and has ratcheted up its investments in European startups. Last year, Nvidia participated in 14 rounds for European tech companies, according to deal-counting platform Dealroom, compared to seven in 2024, five in 2023, one in 2022 and none in 2021 or 2020. The 14 European investments were among the 86 startup rounds it invested in globally that year.
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Nvidia has been on a charm offensive within the industry as it looks to deepen its ties to some of the world's most promising companies, offering technical expertise and supply chain assistance, alongside hard cash. The trend has continued in 2026, with British AI startup Synthesia announcing on Monday that Nvidia had participated in the company's $200 million Series E. The chip giant's spending spree is part of a wider push to deepen its ties to the world's most promising startups as it looks to consolidate its position as AI leader. "Nvidia's investments in European AI firms appear to mirror its broader, global strategy of taking its excess cash and reinvesting in the AI ecosystem across a host of startups," Brian Colello, senior equity analyst at Morningstar, told CNBC. These are all the European tech companies Nvidia, or its venture arm NVentures, invested in last year and the total size of the round it participated in, per Dealroom.
Mistral
Round: 1.7 billion euros, September One of Europe's leading AI labs, French startup Mistral is building models aiming to rival those produced by the likes of OpenAI and Google. Before participating in Mistral's 1.7 billion euro Series C funding round in September, which valued the company at 11.7 billion euros ($13.6 billion), the chip giant invested in the AI company's Series B in 2024.
Nscale
Rounds: $1.1 billion, September and $433 million, October Nscale, which is building data centers and provides AI cloud computing services, courted Nvidia throughout 2025, with the chip giant's CEO, Jensen Huang, announcing in September it would invest £500 million into the company. The UK-based startup promptly announced two rounds, both featuring Nvidia, at the end of September and the start of October.
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