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Renault’s decision to abandon the manufacture of its own Formula 1 engines puts its Alpine team “next to its sporting history”, employee representatives denounced on Tuesday.
The car manufacturer confirmed on Monday that it would end engine production at the Viry-Châtillon (Essonne) site from 2026, ending nearly 50 years of history in elite motorsport.
“This choice is endorsed by the group (Renault) which wishes to reduce the financial risk around F1, even though no serious study has been carried out to assess the impact on future sales and the prestige of the brand “, denounced the employees in a press release.
The Viry site must be transformed into a “center of excellence in engineering and high technology” by the end of 2024, Alpine management said on Monday.
According to management, all affected employees should be offered a position, whether in the development of a prestigious Alpine “supercar”, in research into new electric motor or battery technologies, or the pursuit of other sports programs such as Endurance or the Dakar.
But according to employees, these new projects “still appear very unclear”. “In general, the cessation of the F1 engine, the lack of maturity of the projects provided and the loss of confidence in management pose a major risk of departure of critical skills from the Viry site,” they underline.
As for the “F1 monitoring unit” announced by the team, its workforce and budget still seem “too low” and “call into question the potential return of Alpine as an engine manufacturer in the long term”.
One of the first consequences of stopping the engine will be the departure, on January 1, of 150 external service providers from the Viry-Châtillon site, which also has 334 employees.
According to employees, “partnership solutions” were ruled out by Renault, even though they would have made it possible to reduce the costs of the F1 activity and install a new engine “already largely developed and promising” in the cars of the 2026 season.
The Alpine team said on Tuesday that it was “focused on the 2024 world championship, working hard to deliver the best results on the track until the end of the season”. With six races remaining, the team is at the back of the pack, in 9th place (out of 10) overall.
The mayor of Viry-Chatillon (Les Centristes) regretted in a press release on Tuesday a decision “which hampers any possible return to Formula 1”, and “is also a source of concern regarding the future of the subcontractors of this technological flagship “.
The elected official, Jean-Marie Vilain, wants Renault to “do everything possible” to ensure that each employee on the site is re-employed, but “to date, the guarantees enabling this result to be achieved seem insufficient to reassure the staff”.
“In conjunction with the State, we will ensure that they are provided as quickly as possible in order to avoid a skills drain which would be detrimental to the creation of this future center of excellence and innovation,” said -he emphasized.
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