‘Very difficult’ conversations had with Renault engine staff with future F1 plans in doubt

Closing the doors on Renault’s F1 engine project doesn’t hit Bruno Famin hard because he’s an engine guy, but because he had to tell people who have been “fully dedicated for years” that their passion “won’t last” much longer.

As a team that’s made headlines in the last two years over big-name changes at the top, Alpine threw a curveball last month: they not only announced Famin would be stepping down as the Alpine team boss, but that there are massive changes underway at Viry.

Renault’s 250 F1 engine staff have branded it a ‘betrayal’

The biggest of that, is the scrapping of their Formula 1 engine project.

Although Renault signed up for the 2026 regulations with Formula 1’s new engine formula, they’ve now opted to abandon their engine project and become a customer instead with Mercedes reportedly the preferred option.

For the 250-plus staff in Viry, who have been hard at work designing the 2026 engine, it’s been seen as “a betrayal” .

Union rep Karine Dubreucq told L’Equipe: “We didn’t see it coming. It’s a stab in the back, a betrayal.

“We developed engines here that were capable of becoming F1 champions twelve times over, and now we can’t? They didn’t even wait for the first run on the test bench.”

Famin says it was “very difficult” having to tell those 250 people about Renault’s decision.

“It has nothing to do with being an engine guy or not,” the departing Alpine team boss told the Beyond the Grid podcast. “It has to do with human beings.

“People who are working hard on a project, engine, gearbox or anything else, fully dedicated for years to their passion, lucky enough to walk in their passion, but to who we are saying that it won’t last anymore.

“And of course, it is very difficult, especially while the 2026 project was delivering quite well.

“A lot of investment from the people and the first result we had was good. We had chosen to take some very, let’s say aggressive technical option and the first result was saying that it was right to do that.”

The 2024 Alpine team-mate head-to-head stats

👉 F1 2024: Head-to-head qualifying record between team-mates

👉 F1 2024: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates

But while Renault face the prospect of losing some of their brightest engine people to the engine manufacturers who will make up the 2026 grid, taking with them not only IP knowledge but also their skills, Famin is hoping they can be persuade to stay on in Viry to work in other projects.

“That could be the huge challenge,” he admitted. “The IP of course, is one thing but the real asset is the people. The people, their skills. The real asset is the people, the staff.

“Of course they have been promised a job but for people living their passion of working for their passion, it’s not enough.”

But, he added: “In Viry we are not doing only Formula One, we are also doing all motorsport programs. The Alpine program, all the development of the software, the systems the whole project is being monitored from Viry.

“We are doing Formula E as well where we developed all the FIA manufacturer for the Formula E which is being used by your Nissan and McLaren in Formula E.

“There are a lot of activities even if Formula One is the most part of the activities of course. And now we will have to create new activities more on the very high-level engineering side to get the best use of the skills of the people if they are happy to stay.”

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