Microsoft Partners Up With OpenAI’s Rival Mistral AI!

As companies look to take a lead in the generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) race, they find themselves building and launching new and improved products, investing in internal growth opportunities. In Microsoft’s case, it often leads to partnerships with AI companies.

Despite its deep investments in OpenAI, Microsoft announced it was tying-up with another promising company and rival of OpenAI – Mistral AI.

So, what did Microsoft say and what is Mistral bringing to the table? Let’s explore!
 

What Did Microsoft Announce?

 

• In a blog post released on its website, Microsoft announced that it has signed a multi-year partnership with Mistral AI, through which it would make Mistral Large, Mistral AI’s flagship commercial model, available on Azure AI.

• According to reports, Microsoft will take a minority stake in Mistral against an investment of around $16 million.

• This builds on the partnership struck between the two back in November 2023, in which Microsoft unveiled the integration of Mistral 7B into the Azure AI model catalog.

• According to Mistral AI’s announcement of the availability of its model, Mistral Large can reach top-tier reasoning capabilities, used for complex multilingual reasoning tasks, which include text understanding, transformation and code generation.

• Furthermore, the model is proficient in code and mathematics and can process dozens of documents in a single call, handling languages such as French, German, Spanish, Italian and English, with a nuanced understanding of grammar and cultural context.

• Microsoft’s announcement read, “Today, we are announcing a multi-year partnership between Microsoft and Mistral AI, a recognized leader in generative artificial intelligence. Both companies are fueled by a steadfast dedication to innovation and practical applications, bridging the gap between pioneering research and real-world solutions.”

• Speaking about the partnership, Arthur Mensch, Chief Executive Officer, Mistral AI, said, “We are thrilled to embark on this partnership with Microsoft. With Azure’s cutting-edge AI infrastructure, we are reaching a new milestone in our expansion propelling our innovative research and practical applications to new customers everywhere. Together, we are committed to driving impactful progress in the AI industry and delivering unparalleled value to our customers and partners globally.” 

 

What Are The Partnership’s Key Areas Of Focus?

According to Microsoft’s announcement, the partnership will focus on three core areas:
 

• Supercomputing Infrastructure: Microsoft will bring its Azure AI supercomputing infrastructure to help Mistral with AI training and inference workloads.

• Scale To Market: This will make Mistral AI’s premium models available through Azure AI Studio and Azure Machine Learning model catalog, which will offer OpenAI models along with other open-source and commercial models. Furthermore, Mistral AI will gain opportunities to promote, sell and distribute their models to Microsoft customers around the world.

• AI Research And Development: The two will explore collaborating to train purpose-specific models for select customers.

 

What Did Users Of Mistral Say?

 

• Philippe Rambach, the Chief AI Officer of Schneider Electric, said, “We have tested Mistral Large through the Azure AI Studio in a use case aimed at internal efficiency. The performance was comparable with state-of-the-art models with even better latency. We are looking forward to exploring further this technology in our business.” 

• Nacim Rahal, the Senior Director of Data and AI at Doctolib, said, “After exploring Mistral Large during its early access period, we’ve been impressed by its performance on medical terminology. As we continue to innovate in healthcare, we’re open to collaborations that can help us and our partners grow together. Mistral AI represents an exciting opportunity for mutual advancement in artificial intelligence, both in France and internationally.”

• Séverine Grégoire, the Head of Digital, Innovation and AI at CMA CGM, said, “The Mistral AI models have been crucial in enhancing productivity and collaboration at CMA CGM. Their advanced capabilities have significantly improved the performance of our internal personal assistant, MAIA. Employees are now able to quickly access and engage with information like never before. We are confident that Mistral AI on Azure is the right choice to support our employees and drive innovation across our organization.”

In addition to this announcement, Mistral AI introduced the world to Le Chat, its new conversational assistant, on the same day. As per the company, the chatbot is now in beta testing phase and is calling for the feedback of early adopters and testers.

However, Microsoft’s partnership with Mistral AI has drawn criticism from European Union lawmakers, as they feel it’s an attempt to attain concentration of power by the tech conglomerate, considering Microsoft’s deep ties in place with Mistral AI rivals and industry-leader OpenAI.

How can Microsoft’s partnership with Mistral reshape the GenAI landscape? Do you think this partnership has breached fair trade practices?

Let us know in the comments below!