Mistral CEO Arthur Mensch on building Europe’s $14 billion AI challenger

Mistral CEO Arthur Mensch joins CNBC's Arjun Kharpal to discuss the next phase of the AI revolution, from the race to build data centers and secure computing power to the growing importance of sovereignty. 

Mensch explains why he believes Mistral's business is about turning "electrons into tokens" — the units of text generated and processed by AI models — and why access to compute, GPUs and token generation is becoming a strategic issue for businesses and governments.

He also discusses Mistral's push into enterprise AI agents, the cybersecurity challenges that come with greater automation, and the possibility of developing custom chips in the future as the industry looks to reduce costs and improve performance.

The conversation also explores why the focus is shifting from abstract debates about AGI toward the practical work of deploying AI across businesses, industries and the physical world.

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