Paris: French carmaker Renault will start manufacturing long-range strike drones under a contract with the country’s Directorate General for Armament, and in partnership with local defence contractor Turgis Gaillard.
Renault confirmed the plans after French trade publication L’Usine Nouvelle reported the carmaker will produce the drones at its factories in Le Mans and Cléon, west of Paris, in a contract that could be worth as much as €1 billion (US$1.2 billion) over 10 years. Renault declined to confirm details on the production sites and the value of the contract.
“We were contacted a few months ago by the French Ministry of the Armed Forces about a project to develop a French drone industry,” Fabrice Cambolive, Renault’s chief growth officer, said in an interview. “We were contacted for our industrial, production, and design expertise. This project is currently underway.”
Renault will produce long-range remotely guided munitions similar to Iran’s Shahed drone that can also be used for intelligence gathering and observation, according to L’Usine Nouvelle. Both Russia and Ukraine are increasingly using such cheap long-range drones for deep strikes and to overwhelm air defences.
The drone chassis will be manufactured in Le Mans, while the site in Cléon will produce the engines, BFM reported. The goal is to produce as many as 600 of the long-range drones a month, according to BFM.
Then-Armed Forces Minister Sebastian Lecornu in June last year floated plans to work with an automotive company to manufacture drones, and Renault told employees in September the carmaker had been approached by the Armed Forces Ministry to participate in defence projects, according to French media reports.
Whereas Europe’s defence industry has typically focused on complex systems built in low volumes, often for national clients, carmakers specialise in mass production with tight quality control and cost discipline to compete in global markets.
French President Emmanuel Macron earlier this month warned the country’s defence industry to produce faster and more efficiently, lest the armed forces turn to suppliers elsewhere in Europe.
Macron has repeatedly called for the French defence industry to move to what the president refers to as a “war economy.”
“Renault Group has sought-after expertise in designing, industrialising and mass-producing high-tech objects while controlling quality, costs and deadlines,” the company said in an emailed statement. “Today, this approach is taking shape in the field of drones with a project in partnership with Turgis Gaillard and under the aegis of the DGA.”
Renault, known for its slogan “Créateur d’automobiles,” is a rare example of a major European automaker moving directly into weapons manufacturing, and comes as European governments are exploring how to quickly scale up arms production.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has repeatedly warned that Russia, with its economy geared for war, is outpacing Western weapons production.
Germany’s defence industry has been calling to convert automotive capacity to military production, and defence firm Rheinmetall last year repurposed two automotive-parts plants to mainly focus on manufacturing military goods.
