France's Mistral adds new AI features to rival US chatbots

PARIS (Reuters) -French start-up Mistral announced new features to its AI chatbot Le Chat on Thursday as it tries to carve out a place for itself in a global AI race dominated by the United States and China.    Often presented as France's and Europe's AI champion, Mistral competes with American giants such as OpenAI and Alphabet's Google, but lags behind in terms of market share or revenues.     "We're making Le Chat even more capable, more intuitive — and more fun — with a collection of powerful new features to help you research more thoroughly, express yourself more naturally, and keep your interactions — text, voice, and images — organized in context", said Mistral in a blog post.

While Europe's AI champion Mistral's chatbot has been lagging in some advanced features offered by bigger American rivals such as OpenAI and Google, the latest update brings it closer to the options available in the market.    Among the new features accessible to anyone using Le Chat, users can talk to Mistral's AI generative model instead of typing through its "Voxtral" model.

It can also be used as a research assistant gathering "credible sources" with a "Deep Research" mode. AI models have all been struggling to sort fake news from authentic information.    Valued at $6.2 billion by venture capitalists and feted by French President Emmanuel Macron, Mistral gained global exposure at an international AI gathering in Paris in February.

Mistral - which formed partnerships with several top French companies such as TotalEnergies, CMA CGM or Orange - is intent on developing its corporate clientele and implementing its models on-premises.

(Reporting by Florence LoeveEditing by Ros Russell)