Economic sovereignty is not decreed. It is recruited.
Economic sovereignty is not decreed. It is recruited.
Economic sovereignty is not decreed. It is recruited.
Laroze Partners · Conviction · Sovereignty & Reindustrialization · June 2026
Reindustrialization and economic sovereignty have returned to the center of French debate. We tend to think of them in terms of billions invested and factories reopened. This is a focus error. Before being a matter of capital or production sites, sovereignty is a matter of leaders and talents. We cannot rebuild a sovereign industry without the women and men to carry it forward. And the way a strategic company recruits its leaders is, itself, a decision of sovereignty.
The return of sovereignty
The subject is no longer tabu or partisan. With one year to go before the 2027 deadline, reindustrialization is almost unanimously featured in the programs, driven by an awareness born of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, which revealed the extent of our dependencies.
The figures show how far we have come, and how far we still have to go. The share of Made in France in domestic demand fell from 89% in 1965 to 78% in 2019, and is only 38% in the manufacturing industry, a more pronounced decline than in Germany, which stands at 52%. To reverse the trend, the France 2030 plan committed 54 billion euros, and more than 300 net factories have been created since 2021, generating approximately 100,000 direct jobs.
But nothing is guaranteed. For the first time since 2016, the year 2024 saw more industrial site closures than openings. The bounce-back is real and fragile. It needs to be consolidated, and neither speeches nor funding alone will do it.
The lesson of luxury
Before going any further, we must dismiss a misunderstanding. Sovereignty is not isolationism, and French expertise is not valuable just because of its label. Luxury, our crown jewel, has just learned this at its own expense.
For a long time, major houses believed they had a winning equation: create in Paris, sell massively in China, and capitalize on the prestige of Made in France. This model is cracking. Chinese consumers are turning to national brands. On Tmall, Chinese jeweler Laopu achieved $630 million in sales, whereas Van Cleef & Arpels made $57 million. Songmont bags sell for around $420, whereas the Hermès equivalent exceeds $5,000. The result can be read on the stock exchange: LVMH shares have lost around 30% compared to their 2023 peak, and Kering near 60% since its 2021 peak.
The lesson is essential, and it applies to all that follows. French excellence cannot be declared; it must be proven and reinvented. An origin is never enough. It is precisely because French expertise is precious that it cannot rest on its laurels.
Dependence, a concrete strategic risk
Sovereignty is not an abstraction. It is measured by specific dependencies, the cost of which we have discovered.
Dependence is primarily industrial. The health crisis revealed our vulnerability regarding critical goods. Hence the relocations initiated under France 2030, such as the manufacture of 100% European paracetamol in Toulouse, aimed at reducing strong dependence on Asian imports. The same logic drives the reconstruction of a semiconductor sector around Grenoble, or the relocation of sovereign munitions production to Bergerac. Every time, it is about gaining back control of a chain from which a vital link had been delegated.
Dependence is also capitalistic, and this is a less visible dimension. French technology champions raise funds globally, and the question of who controls their capital, and where their value remains anchored, becomes strategic. Mistral, the flagship of European sovereignty in artificial intelligence, is a prime illustration. Its capitalization table mixes American, European, and Asian funds. The clearest signal came in 2025, when Dutch company ASML became one of its top shareholders, with about 11% of the capital, in a transaction explicitly presented as a way to reduce dependence on Silicon Valley. Capital sovereignty is not a posture. It is a choice made, funding round after funding round.
The real missing link: leaders and talents
Here is what investment plans and relocation announcements underestimate. We can raise capital, pass laws, design sectors. Nothing is built without the women and men to do it. And that is where the shoe pinches.
France is short of at least 10,000 engineers per year. Entire professions—electrical engineering, nuclear, control-command, welding—have become almost impossible to find. Yet, this deficit directly impacts the relocation of factories and the success of projects financed by the State. The phrase, borrowed from a recent column, is accurate: reindustrializing France without strengthening its engineer base is building without foundations.
And the subject does not stop with engineers. Rebuilding sovereign champions requires leaders capable of building sustainable, locally anchored models in hyper-competitive industries. Leaders who think about growth and resilience, performance and strategic autonomy. These profiles are rare. Identifying and attracting them is a condition of sovereignty, in the same way as capital or real estate. Sovereignty is financed, but it is also recruited.
Recruiting your leaders is also a decision of sovereignty
This is where the subject directly aligns with our profession, supported by two arguments, neither of which is chauvinistic.
The first is a fine understanding of the context. Take a regulated market like healthcare. Recruiting a leader here means constantly balancing two demands. On one side, a talented and innovative profile, capable of pushing boundaries. On the other, mastery of the codes of a complex industry, the weight of regulation, and key knowledge of the players and their balances. Who better than a French expert in the sector can read this double demand, bring a vision, and help with decision-making in this specific context? This understanding cannot be improvised, nor can it be delegated to a network that only has a distant view of the French market.
The second is data sovereignty. An executive search firm handles the most sensitive information possible regarding leadership, strategy, and organizational vulnerabilities. Where this data, these relationships, and this knowledge reside is not a minor detail. It is, in itself, a question of sovereignty. Entrusting the search for strategic leaders to a firm rooted in France means maintaining control over information that touches the very heart of the company.
Under one condition, always the same, set by the lesson of luxury. This French value is proven by the rigor and quality of the work; it is not claimed on a label.
Sovereignty is a project of talents
France has the will, which is now consensual. It has committed the capital, with France 2030. What remains for it to secure is the leadership and talents to carry this ambition to the end. Without them, reindustrialization will remain a budget line, not a productive reality.
Economic sovereignty is a project of talents before being a project of factories. Rebuilding this human base, identifying the leaders capable of building a sovereign economy, and doing so with a demand for quality that is proven rather than proclaimed—that is where the real work begins. Sovereignty cannot be declared. It is built, and it is recruited.
Laroze Partners — Executive Search Healthcare & Pharma · Medtech · Retail · Tech & Services · Consulting
Sources: France 2030 and Directorate General for Enterprises · reindustrialization barometers 2025-2026 · Forbes article on the shortage of engineers · FashionNetwork and Revue Politique et Parlementaire on luxury and the guochao movement · CNBC and corporate communications on the financing of Mistral. This article reflects the practitioner perspective of Laroze Partners.
Laroze Partners · Conviction · Sovereignty & Reindustrialization · June 2026
Reindustrialization and economic sovereignty have returned to the center of French debate. We tend to think of them in terms of billions invested and factories reopened. This is a focus error. Before being a matter of capital or production sites, sovereignty is a matter of leaders and talents. We cannot rebuild a sovereign industry without the women and men to carry it forward. And the way a strategic company recruits its leaders is, itself, a decision of sovereignty.
The return of sovereignty
The subject is no longer tabu or partisan. With one year to go before the 2027 deadline, reindustrialization is almost unanimously featured in the programs, driven by an awareness born of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, which revealed the extent of our dependencies.
The figures show how far we have come, and how far we still have to go. The share of Made in France in domestic demand fell from 89% in 1965 to 78% in 2019, and is only 38% in the manufacturing industry, a more pronounced decline than in Germany, which stands at 52%. To reverse the trend, the France 2030 plan committed 54 billion euros, and more than 300 net factories have been created since 2021, generating approximately 100,000 direct jobs.
But nothing is guaranteed. For the first time since 2016, the year 2024 saw more industrial site closures than openings. The bounce-back is real and fragile. It needs to be consolidated, and neither speeches nor funding alone will do it.
The lesson of luxury
Before going any further, we must dismiss a misunderstanding. Sovereignty is not isolationism, and French expertise is not valuable just because of its label. Luxury, our crown jewel, has just learned this at its own expense.
For a long time, major houses believed they had a winning equation: create in Paris, sell massively in China, and capitalize on the prestige of Made in France. This model is cracking. Chinese consumers are turning to national brands. On Tmall, Chinese jeweler Laopu achieved $630 million in sales, whereas Van Cleef & Arpels made $57 million. Songmont bags sell for around $420, whereas the Hermès equivalent exceeds $5,000. The result can be read on the stock exchange: LVMH shares have lost around 30% compared to their 2023 peak, and Kering near 60% since its 2021 peak.
The lesson is essential, and it applies to all that follows. French excellence cannot be declared; it must be proven and reinvented. An origin is never enough. It is precisely because French expertise is precious that it cannot rest on its laurels.
Dependence, a concrete strategic risk
Sovereignty is not an abstraction. It is measured by specific dependencies, the cost of which we have discovered.
Dependence is primarily industrial. The health crisis revealed our vulnerability regarding critical goods. Hence the relocations initiated under France 2030, such as the manufacture of 100% European paracetamol in Toulouse, aimed at reducing strong dependence on Asian imports. The same logic drives the reconstruction of a semiconductor sector around Grenoble, or the relocation of sovereign munitions production to Bergerac. Every time, it is about gaining back control of a chain from which a vital link had been delegated.
Dependence is also capitalistic, and this is a less visible dimension. French technology champions raise funds globally, and the question of who controls their capital, and where their value remains anchored, becomes strategic. Mistral, the flagship of European sovereignty in artificial intelligence, is a prime illustration. Its capitalization table mixes American, European, and Asian funds. The clearest signal came in 2025, when Dutch company ASML became one of its top shareholders, with about 11% of the capital, in a transaction explicitly presented as a way to reduce dependence on Silicon Valley. Capital sovereignty is not a posture. It is a choice made, funding round after funding round.
The real missing link: leaders and talents
Here is what investment plans and relocation announcements underestimate. We can raise capital, pass laws, design sectors. Nothing is built without the women and men to do it. And that is where the shoe pinches.
France is short of at least 10,000 engineers per year. Entire professions—electrical engineering, nuclear, control-command, welding—have become almost impossible to find. Yet, this deficit directly impacts the relocation of factories and the success of projects financed by the State. The phrase, borrowed from a recent column, is accurate: reindustrializing France without strengthening its engineer base is building without foundations.
And the subject does not stop with engineers. Rebuilding sovereign champions requires leaders capable of building sustainable, locally anchored models in hyper-competitive industries. Leaders who think about growth and resilience, performance and strategic autonomy. These profiles are rare. Identifying and attracting them is a condition of sovereignty, in the same way as capital or real estate. Sovereignty is financed, but it is also recruited.
Recruiting your leaders is also a decision of sovereignty
This is where the subject directly aligns with our profession, supported by two arguments, neither of which is chauvinistic.
The first is a fine understanding of the context. Take a regulated market like healthcare. Recruiting a leader here means constantly balancing two demands. On one side, a talented and innovative profile, capable of pushing boundaries. On the other, mastery of the codes of a complex industry, the weight of regulation, and key knowledge of the players and their balances. Who better than a French expert in the sector can read this double demand, bring a vision, and help with decision-making in this specific context? This understanding cannot be improvised, nor can it be delegated to a network that only has a distant view of the French market.
The second is data sovereignty. An executive search firm handles the most sensitive information possible regarding leadership, strategy, and organizational vulnerabilities. Where this data, these relationships, and this knowledge reside is not a minor detail. It is, in itself, a question of sovereignty. Entrusting the search for strategic leaders to a firm rooted in France means maintaining control over information that touches the very heart of the company.
Under one condition, always the same, set by the lesson of luxury. This French value is proven by the rigor and quality of the work; it is not claimed on a label.
Sovereignty is a project of talents
France has the will, which is now consensual. It has committed the capital, with France 2030. What remains for it to secure is the leadership and talents to carry this ambition to the end. Without them, reindustrialization will remain a budget line, not a productive reality.
Economic sovereignty is a project of talents before being a project of factories. Rebuilding this human base, identifying the leaders capable of building a sovereign economy, and doing so with a demand for quality that is proven rather than proclaimed—that is where the real work begins. Sovereignty cannot be declared. It is built, and it is recruited.
Laroze Partners — Executive Search Healthcare & Pharma · Medtech · Retail · Tech & Services · Consulting
Sources: France 2030 and Directorate General for Enterprises · reindustrialization barometers 2025-2026 · Forbes article on the shortage of engineers · FashionNetwork and Revue Politique et Parlementaire on luxury and the guochao movement · CNBC and corporate communications on the financing of Mistral. This article reflects the practitioner perspective of Laroze Partners.
Laroze Partners · Conviction · Sovereignty & Reindustrialization · June 2026
Reindustrialization and economic sovereignty have returned to the center of French debate. We tend to think of them in terms of billions invested and factories reopened. This is a focus error. Before being a matter of capital or production sites, sovereignty is a matter of leaders and talents. We cannot rebuild a sovereign industry without the women and men to carry it forward. And the way a strategic company recruits its leaders is, itself, a decision of sovereignty.
The return of sovereignty
The subject is no longer tabu or partisan. With one year to go before the 2027 deadline, reindustrialization is almost unanimously featured in the programs, driven by an awareness born of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, which revealed the extent of our dependencies.
The figures show how far we have come, and how far we still have to go. The share of Made in France in domestic demand fell from 89% in 1965 to 78% in 2019, and is only 38% in the manufacturing industry, a more pronounced decline than in Germany, which stands at 52%. To reverse the trend, the France 2030 plan committed 54 billion euros, and more than 300 net factories have been created since 2021, generating approximately 100,000 direct jobs.
But nothing is guaranteed. For the first time since 2016, the year 2024 saw more industrial site closures than openings. The bounce-back is real and fragile. It needs to be consolidated, and neither speeches nor funding alone will do it.
The lesson of luxury
Before going any further, we must dismiss a misunderstanding. Sovereignty is not isolationism, and French expertise is not valuable just because of its label. Luxury, our crown jewel, has just learned this at its own expense.
For a long time, major houses believed they had a winning equation: create in Paris, sell massively in China, and capitalize on the prestige of Made in France. This model is cracking. Chinese consumers are turning to national brands. On Tmall, Chinese jeweler Laopu achieved $630 million in sales, whereas Van Cleef & Arpels made $57 million. Songmont bags sell for around $420, whereas the Hermès equivalent exceeds $5,000. The result can be read on the stock exchange: LVMH shares have lost around 30% compared to their 2023 peak, and Kering near 60% since its 2021 peak.
The lesson is essential, and it applies to all that follows. French excellence cannot be declared; it must be proven and reinvented. An origin is never enough. It is precisely because French expertise is precious that it cannot rest on its laurels.
Dependence, a concrete strategic risk
Sovereignty is not an abstraction. It is measured by specific dependencies, the cost of which we have discovered.
Dependence is primarily industrial. The health crisis revealed our vulnerability regarding critical goods. Hence the relocations initiated under France 2030, such as the manufacture of 100% European paracetamol in Toulouse, aimed at reducing strong dependence on Asian imports. The same logic drives the reconstruction of a semiconductor sector around Grenoble, or the relocation of sovereign munitions production to Bergerac. Every time, it is about gaining back control of a chain from which a vital link had been delegated.
Dependence is also capitalistic, and this is a less visible dimension. French technology champions raise funds globally, and the question of who controls their capital, and where their value remains anchored, becomes strategic. Mistral, the flagship of European sovereignty in artificial intelligence, is a prime illustration. Its capitalization table mixes American, European, and Asian funds. The clearest signal came in 2025, when Dutch company ASML became one of its top shareholders, with about 11% of the capital, in a transaction explicitly presented as a way to reduce dependence on Silicon Valley. Capital sovereignty is not a posture. It is a choice made, funding round after funding round.
The real missing link: leaders and talents
Here is what investment plans and relocation announcements underestimate. We can raise capital, pass laws, design sectors. Nothing is built without the women and men to do it. And that is where the shoe pinches.
France is short of at least 10,000 engineers per year. Entire professions—electrical engineering, nuclear, control-command, welding—have become almost impossible to find. Yet, this deficit directly impacts the relocation of factories and the success of projects financed by the State. The phrase, borrowed from a recent column, is accurate: reindustrializing France without strengthening its engineer base is building without foundations.
And the subject does not stop with engineers. Rebuilding sovereign champions requires leaders capable of building sustainable, locally anchored models in hyper-competitive industries. Leaders who think about growth and resilience, performance and strategic autonomy. These profiles are rare. Identifying and attracting them is a condition of sovereignty, in the same way as capital or real estate. Sovereignty is financed, but it is also recruited.
Recruiting your leaders is also a decision of sovereignty
This is where the subject directly aligns with our profession, supported by two arguments, neither of which is chauvinistic.
The first is a fine understanding of the context. Take a regulated market like healthcare. Recruiting a leader here means constantly balancing two demands. On one side, a talented and innovative profile, capable of pushing boundaries. On the other, mastery of the codes of a complex industry, the weight of regulation, and key knowledge of the players and their balances. Who better than a French expert in the sector can read this double demand, bring a vision, and help with decision-making in this specific context? This understanding cannot be improvised, nor can it be delegated to a network that only has a distant view of the French market.
The second is data sovereignty. An executive search firm handles the most sensitive information possible regarding leadership, strategy, and organizational vulnerabilities. Where this data, these relationships, and this knowledge reside is not a minor detail. It is, in itself, a question of sovereignty. Entrusting the search for strategic leaders to a firm rooted in France means maintaining control over information that touches the very heart of the company.
Under one condition, always the same, set by the lesson of luxury. This French value is proven by the rigor and quality of the work; it is not claimed on a label.
Sovereignty is a project of talents
France has the will, which is now consensual. It has committed the capital, with France 2030. What remains for it to secure is the leadership and talents to carry this ambition to the end. Without them, reindustrialization will remain a budget line, not a productive reality.
Economic sovereignty is a project of talents before being a project of factories. Rebuilding this human base, identifying the leaders capable of building a sovereign economy, and doing so with a demand for quality that is proven rather than proclaimed—that is where the real work begins. Sovereignty cannot be declared. It is built, and it is recruited.
Laroze Partners — Executive Search Healthcare & Pharma · Medtech · Retail · Tech & Services · Consulting
Sources: France 2030 and Directorate General for Enterprises · reindustrialization barometers 2025-2026 · Forbes article on the shortage of engineers · FashionNetwork and Revue Politique et Parlementaire on luxury and the guochao movement · CNBC and corporate communications on the financing of Mistral. This article reflects the practitioner perspective of Laroze Partners.
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CONTACT
Let's work together.
At Laroze Partners, we believe that recruiting a leader is a strategic, foundational, and engaging act. That’s why we have turned it into an art of precision: listening, intuition, method. We offer customized support over time for a real impact in service of the success of your executive teams.
CONTACT
Let's work together.
At Laroze Partners, we believe that recruiting a leader is a strategic, foundational, and engaging act. That’s why we have turned it into an art of precision: listening, intuition, method. We offer customized support over time for a real impact in service of the success of your executive teams.
CONTACT
Let's work together.
At Laroze Partners, we believe that recruiting a leader is a strategic, foundational, and engaging act. That’s why we have turned it into an art of precision: listening, intuition, method. We offer customized support over time for a real impact in service of the success of your executive teams.
