Many other machine builders in the area have large parts of the hardware replicated as a software simulator so they can test the code as much as they wish. It’s

Many other machine builders in the area have large parts of the hardware replicated as a software simulator so they can test the code as much as they wish. It’s not uncommon to begin load testing the software (incl lots of error scenarios, simulate a robot arm getting stuck etc) before the first prototype of a machine got put together. It’s really unique for such a competent machine builder to not have this, and it’s 100% due to their excellence being in physics and mechanical engineering, a culture of treating software as an afterthought for too long. Note, I don't think ASML still treats software as an afterthought, but they did for a long enough to make it really hard to catch up.