Nvidia is quietly becoming Europe's most aggressive AI investor. The chip giant participated in 14 funding rounds across European startups in 2025, double the seven deals it cut in 2024, according to Dealroom data. It's a strategic blitz that positions Nvidia not just as a GPU supplier but as kingmaker in Europe's AI ecosystem - backing everything from frontier model labs like Mistral AI to quantum computing upstart Quantinuum, while its European investments represented a sixth of its 86 global startup rounds last year.
Nvidia just became Europe's most active AI investor, and the numbers tell a story of calculated expansion. The company participated in 14 European startup funding rounds throughout 2025, exactly double its seven deals in 2024, according to deal-tracking platform Dealroom. Go back to 2020 or 2021, and Nvidia made zero European investments. The acceleration isn't subtle.
These 14 European rounds were part of 86 global startup investments Nvidia made last year, positioning the chip giant as venture capital player alongside its dominance in GPU supply. But this isn't traditional VC - it's strategic ecosystem building. "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.
The portfolio reads like a who's who of European tech ambition. Mistral AI, France's answer to OpenAI, landed Nvidia backing in its massive €1.7 billion Series C in September, valuing the frontier model lab at €11.7 billion ($13.6 billion). Nvidia had already invested in Mistral's Series B in 2024, doubling down on one of Europe's few credible large language model competitors.
