French AI company announces new, private model
The company's new model, named "Le Chonk," is its first release in five months. Mistral says it outruns some of its Chinese competitors in several areas.
French AI startup Mistral unveiled plans on Tuesday to launch its largest open-weight model, named Le Chonk, designed for users prioritizing data privacy. Unlike popular AI models from American companies like Anthropic and OpenAI, which rely on closed models, Le Chonk will be made available to the public on October 27.
Government officials and cybersecurity experts will have access to a version of the model with fewer safety restrictions for testing its capabilities. Earlier this month, Mistral raised €3 billion euros ($3.4 billion), the largest technology fundraising in Europe.
The new AI model enables users to download and modify the "weights" that govern how it operates on their own servers. An open-weight model allows users to download the software and run it on their own hardware. Despite the top US models running on their own proprietary models, many Chinese competitors utilize open-weight models.
Mistral, Europe's leading AI company, claims Le Chonk surpasses many rival open-weight models in certain areas, including cybersecurity. Mistral CEO Arthur Mensch stated at an event in Abu Dhabi that the new model is "actually above the Chinese models" in specific domains, though he did not name them. Mistral has positioned itself as a safer European alternative to its main US competitors, especially following recent warnings from those companies about AI's potential dangers.
Written by urgent.news from Deutsche Welle Science's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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