I keep coming back to the same question when writing about European technology: what exactly do we want to keep in Europe? The usual answer is something like: semiconductor production, cloud infrastructure, AI models and perhaps a few strategically important factories. But after reading about French robotics company Wandercraft (https://en.wandercraft.eu/) and its cooperation with Renault, I think there is another part of the story that deserves much more attention. Europe should not only build products. It should also build the machines that build those products.
That may sound slightly old-fashioned in a world where almost every discussion about technology quickly turns into a discussion about software and AI. But there is a very practical reason for it. If you build your own production machines, you learn from them. You discover that a certain component is unnecessarily expensive. That another part could be lighter. That a production step takes too long. That a tolerance does not need to be quite so precise. Or that changing some software, mechanics or electronics could make the entire production process better.
In other words, a factory is not simply a place where products come off a production line. It is also a rather large laboratory.
Robots building European industrial knowledge
Wandercraft is an interesting example. The French company originally developed robotic exoskeletons for people who have difficulty walking. More than ten years of developing balance systems, actuators, mechanics and control software eventually resulted in something else: Calvin, a humanoid robot designed for industrial work.
And importantly, this isn’t primarily a robot designed to dance on a stage or generate spectacular YouTube videos. It is designed to work in a factory. Renault is already testing Calvin in its factory in Douai, where the robot moves things such as car tyres. Renault plans to have around 350 humanoid robots working in its French and Spanish factories by the end of 2027.
But the really interesting part is the relationship between the two companies. Renault is not simply buying robots from Wandercraft. It is also helping the company figure out how to manufacture those robots at scale. Wandercraft brings robotics and AI knowledge. Renault brings decades of experience in mass production, supply chains, quality control and designing products that can actually be manufactured at an acceptable cost. That combination makes a lot of sense.
Keep the feedback loop close
There is another detail I particularly like. Wandercraft says the components in its current robot all come from Europe. That matters. Because if the robot is designed in Europe, manufactured using European components, deployed in European factories and improved based on what happens in those factories, you create a very useful feedback loop: engineers see what breaks, factories discover what works, production specialists improve how the robot itself is manufactured and developers adjust the software and control systems. And then you do it all over again. That is industrial knowledge being created continuously. Move too many parts of that chain elsewhere and eventually part of that knowledge moves with it.
Europe already has an enormous high-quality manufacturing base, many specialised machine builders and companies that know how to manufacture complicated products at scale. We sometimes seem strangely eager to underestimate how valuable that is.
Perhaps technological sovereignty is not only about owning an AI model or running a European cloud. Sometimes it is also about knowing how to build the machine that builds the machine.
Here is a video of Andreas Klinger from the European investment fund PROTOTYPE (https://www.prototypecap.com/) visiting Wandercraft.