AI for Citizens

It’s clear that artificial intelligence will have significant and lasting impact not only on companies, but also on governments and societies. However, in the rush to attempt to put AI to use, it all too often seems that AI is something that happens to people and countries, an inevitability beyond their influence that leaves them at the mercy of closed, opaque systems designed and operated by distant, behemoth corporations. 

The risks of “one size fits all” AI

Today’s AI landscape is dominated by closed, opaque offerings with limited flexibility, encouraging a “one size fits all” approach to AI. As public institutions look for solutions to help them implement AI strategies, those offerings come with significant limitations and risks.

• Closed and inflexible

  Offerings from the dominant vendors are largely proprietary, black-box offerings that are difficult or impossible to tailor and customize, severely limiting transparency, flexibility, and effectiveness while leaving countries captive to the priorities, architectures, and approaches of outside vendors.

• Dependence on dominant vendors

  A small number of dominant providers currently provide the lion’s share of AI technology and expertise, sapping local innovation, creating monopolistic vendor lock-in, and transferring significant economic value to foreign players.

• Subject to geopolitical risks

  Dependence on vendors and technologies that are subject to control and regulation by superpowers creates significant risk and uncertainty as AI increasingly becomes a strategic lever in trade, regulatory, and competitive battles.

• Lack of control

  Dependence on foreign technology can severely limit the ability to ensure that data transfer, processing, and governance are aligned with national requirements for safety, privacy, and protection.

• AI diversity

  Reliance on AI models, algorithms, and applications tuned and trained by a few dominant foreign vendors can easily result in AI that does not serves the full range of languages, cultures, norms, and perspectives globally.

To sum it up, "one size fits all" AI offerings cannot meet the tactical nor strategic needs of regions and countries. Understanding local languages, incorporating local context, and aligning with unique priorities in each region and country requires AI solutions that are designed and tailored to fit the specific use cases and requirements of those regions, countries and their people. Not only that, but “one size fits all” AI offerings take control of the impact of AI on their future out of the hands of countries and their citizens.

Putting your AI future in your hands

The AI for Citizens initiative provides an alternative to “one size fits all” AI solutions. It is grounded in the principles of openness, collaboration, choice, and autonomy, empowering countries to choose the infrastructure, technologies, and partners that best help them reach their unique objectives. 

AI for Citizens works in close partnership with governments and local entities to build solutions tailored to local needs and goals, offering Mistral AI's technology, expertise, and experience to accelerate local AI strategies and ecosystems. This initiative provides:

Your partner to deliver strategic AI 

This initiative uniquely unlocks opportunities to deliver on key strategic priorities for AI:

• Transform government services with AI

  Establish centers of excellence to build local expertise within government to help government agencies improve their services and create new services using AI.

• Spark research and development innovation

  Implement customized research and development programs, including co-training and verticalization of models to meet specific cultural needs and language needs by leveraging existing datasets, models, and projects in collaboration with local entities such as universities, public and private research centers.

• Foster a vibrant AI ecosystem

  Build an ecosystem of companies and organizations skilled in AI innovation and implementation.

• Build AI education, capability and fluency

  Help to develop local AI talent pools and skills that attract investment and economic opportunities for citizens.

Mistral AI is already working closely with countries to help deliver on these possibilities, supporting sovereign AI strategies that respect local languages, laws, and cultural values. Our work is rooted in the belief that AI should strengthen national institutions rather than make governments dependent on, and beholden to, foreign AI giants. We want to enable governments to become self-reliant with the most powerful technology of our time, delivering better services, responding to citizen needs, and preserving their unique heritage for future generations. By investing in local expertise, secure deployments, and long-term partnerships, we aim to help nations build resilient, future-ready public systems that advance research, improve education, and protect cultural continuity in an increasingly digital world.

Get started 

If you're looking for a partner to help you in your AI journey, we'd love to talk with you. Simply fill out this form to get started. For more information, visit mistral.ai/solutions/ai-for-citizens.