Renault’s determination to finish its Formulation 1 works engine venture has been one of many largest tales of the 2024 season.
The transfer, solely made official final week, has triggered big controversy inside the manufacturing facility partitions at Viry-Chatillon, the place the French producer’s F1 energy items have been made because the Nineteen Seventies.
However whereas abandoning its personal engine in favour of a buyer Mercedes deal for the Alpine F1 crew is seismic, it was fairly attention-grabbing that the information was tucked away in a sentence in a press launch that was as a substitute targeted extra on the transformation of its engine facility right into a high-tech engineering centre.
It added to the intrigue of why issues have been altering in such a dramatic means, with Alpine’s present management duo of crew principal Oliver Oakes and F1 advisor Flavio Briatore each being clear that the change of engine plan was instigated by administration above them.
However the first solutions have now appeared, with Renault CEO Luca de Meo providing some fascinating explanations of the motivations behind the decision in an unique interview with French newspaper L’Equipe.
Cash talks
Whereas Renault’s engine workers had repeatedly talked concerning the 2026 engine venture being heading in the right direction with its efficiency figures, de Meo has emphasised that whereas the decision was “heartbreaking” it was the bottom-line monetary figures that talked in the long run.
Esteban Ocon, Alpine A524
Photograph by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Photographs
“I’m a supervisor. I run a listed firm,” he mentioned. “And I’ve to rethink the F1 venture, to lastly win.
“So I’m searching for shortcuts to realize this. We’ve got develop into invisible. One other two years like this and the venture would fully deflate. We’ve got been on a downward slope for 3 seasons. We needed to shake all that up. With a monetary logic in thoughts.”
For de Meo, the large funding required to provide an engine – which is within the tons of of thousands and thousands of {dollars} – made zero sense when a less expensive buyer energy unit could possibly be slotted in that will ship simply as a lot, if no more, efficiency for lower than $20 million.
“Actual fanatics are usually not involved by this calculation. I’m,” he mentioned.
De Meo went on to clarify that the brand new guidelines coming for 2026 – with a larger reliance on effectivity and battery energy – put issues in an ever sharper focus when it got here to prices.
He mentioned Viry, with 340 workers on F1, might haven’t any likelihood of competing with Mercedes, who he suggests employs 900.
He added: “They’ve check benches that we do not have. The transition to the hybrid period required highly effective investments that have been underestimated on the time. We function, structurally, with three cylinders when others have eight.
“Once I arrived 4 years in the past, the group needed to cease F1. If it is nonetheless there, it is as a result of I saved the factor. However we do not have the construction to be on the forefront of battery chemistry growth, software program administration, power restoration.
“It is not simply placing an engine on the bench and saying: ‘Hey boss, I am doing 415 kW!'”
Win on Sunday, promote on Monday no extra
Luca de Meo, CEO, Renault Group
Photograph by: Michael Potts / Motorsport Photographs
F1 has lengthy been a invaluable advertising instrument for engine producers, who’ve counted on success being adopted by by showroom gross sales.
However de Meo suggests the hyperlinks between F1 and highway automobiles have develop into blurred now, as folks affiliate automotive manufacturers with various things.
Aston Martin’s success on monitor, for instance, ought to ship an uptick in its personal highway automotive gross sales. The identical is true for McLaren. De Meo is obvious that the worth of constructing your personal engine now has disappeared.
“The sponsors come for a crew, not for an engine,” he mentioned. “The companions signal with McLaren, not with Mercedes beneath the hood. The F1 public has modified. It has expanded to incorporate younger folks, girls. This new clientele has a special interpretation of this sport.
“We help a driver, a color, a model. Not an engine. Alpine, given our rating, is shedding bonuses. Sponsors are uncommon. We’ve got a gap. My shareholders know the way to rely. Alpine should become profitable.”
He additionally mentioned that his dream of constructing a French tremendous crew in the end failed as a result of the nation didn’t get behind it.
“I needed to make a French crew, the French Ferrari,” he mentioned. “I put two French drivers within the bucket seats: they crashed into one another.
“Take a tour of an A524 with me, there’s not a single French sponsor. Not one! I knocked on many doorways. In useless…”
The vultures are circling
Pierre Gasly, Alpine A524
Photograph by: Erik Junius
Whereas Renault and Alpine have assured jobs for the workers who have been beforehand employed on its F1 engine venture, de Meo accepts that not all could also be prepared to tackle totally different roles.
However he has revealed that those that need to keep on in F1 could also be properly positioned, with rivals already having been in contact about luring them elsewhere.
De Meo added: “If there are some who’re positively pushed by the concept of constructing an F1 engine, they are going to haven’t any downside repositioning themselves.
“Fred Vasseur, the boss of the Ferrari crew, referred to as us to ask if he might get some folks out of our firm and keep away from them having gardening depart earlier than going to work for them. OK. That is life. We’re not going to imprison our guys.”
The continued sale rumours
It was urged earlier this yr that Renault closing down its F1 engine venture was a key step in it placing its crew up on the market.
Esteban Ocon, Alpine A524
Photograph by: Alpine
That is one thing that has been repeatedly denied and de Meo has but once more defined why it is senseless to undergo with it.
He says that, with the worth of groups persevering with to skyrocket beneath F1’s increase, that there isn’t any cause to dump the operation.
“I obtain calls each 15 days from financiers, eccentrics. who need to enter F1,” he mentioned. “They know that after 2026 it would value rather more.
“If you’re given £1 billion right now to take the crew, they are going to be capable of resell it for double, two years later. It is stuffed with speculators right here.
“I’ve refused 50 instances. A crew will quickly be value between $3 and 5 billion. I’m not going to promote; I’m not silly.
“Being in F1 is important for the Alpine model. We’re in a closed membership. It offers credibility to the model amongst automotive fanatics. We don’t want this cash.”