Not a military analyst, but I'll try. Also French, so highly biased. That sounds a bit like the F-35, which was supposed to be a common platform for three diff

Not a military analyst, but I'll try. Also French, so highly biased. That sounds a bit like the F-35, which was supposed to be a common platform for three different military jets with highly conflicting requirements (US Air Force wants an affordable single-engine stealth supersonic fighter, US Navy wants it operable from a aircraft carrier, US Marines wants it hovering like a Harrier), which is the definitive example on how to NOT manage a multirole jet fighter program, to the point where it's still not in full-rate production twenty years after the start of the program, arguably still not fully operational, still hideously expensive on per-hour fly rate and finally the US decided to both modernize old F-15/F-16 jets and start developing the sixth-generation NGAD. The Dassault Rafale on the other hand has three variants (B for twin seats, C for mono seat, M for the French Navy) which are basically identical except for a reinforced undercarriage for the M variant. Increased development costs and delays were mostly because of shrinking defense budgets and political squabbling post Cold War, not because of technical development issues. While the F1 block was an emergency stopgap for the Navy, later iterations and especially the F3R have proven to be very versatile and able to carry out basically any mission that the French Air Force and French Navy has, to the point that it is expected to be the only fighter/bomber/interceptor type in service when all the remaining Mirage 2000 variants get decommissioned in the coming years. I'd say the main differences are that culturally Dassault at its core is more of an design and engineering shop than an aircraft manufacturer (most manufacturing is outsourced, critical components and assembly are done in-house) so emphasis is placed more on design than production [0]; France wants an independent defense industry and an all-around fully capable military on a budget, thus we have no choice but to keep our costs under control in order to afford all of our gear; and finally while the Rafale ecosystem has a lot of companies (Thalès and Safran for the biggest subcontractors), Dassault is unquestionably in charge of the program industrially and the DGA knows better than to try and micromanage them or to ask impossible or unbearably expensive requirements. [0] https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R1148.html https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R1148.html for an analysis of the Mirage days of Dassault