The team leading Renault’s F1 engineers race with ‘few dozen’ interviews held

Ferrari have not hesitated in dipping into Renault’s engine pool, a report claiming they’ve already interviewed a ‘few dozen engine engineers’ from Viry-Châtillon.

Renault confirmed last month they would abandon their F1 2026 engine project, bringing to an end over 40 years of F1 power unit manufacturing at the Viry facility.

Ferrari have held interviews, but Audi and Red Bull are also in the hunt

After weeks of speculation, negotiations and protests, Renault made the call to scrap their engine project , although work will continue at Viry through to the end of the F1 2025 season as Renault will continue to power their Alpine team before it makes the change from works outfit to customer team in 2026.

In its place, Renault plan to have an “F1 monitoring unit” based at the factory.

“Following consultation with the employee representatives at Viry, Alpine has decided to establish an F1 monitoring unit,” said a statement from the French manufacturer.

“This unit will aim to maintain employees’ knowledge and skills in this sport and remain at the forefront of innovation for Hypertech Alpine’s various projects.”

However, holding onto staff may be easier said than done.

According to Auto Motor und Sport , already a ‘few dozen engine engineers’ from Renault’s F1 project have held job interviews with Ferrari with the Scuderia keen to bring their knowledge over to Maranello. And keep it out of rivals’ hands as Renault had already run the F1 2026 engine on the bench.

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But they aren’t the only power unit manufacturer signed up for 2026 who are in the hunt as Audi and Red Bull Powertrains have also “put out feelers for Renault employees”.

For Audi and Red Bull Powertrains, signing key Renault personnel would be a big scoop as both are currently designing and building their very first F1 power units, so bringing in already experienced staff from outside could be a shortcut to success.

Red Bull, who are building their power unit in conjunction with Ford, have already bolstered their Powertrains division by signing over 200 people from Mercedes’ High Performance Powertrains.

Responding to Mercedes motorsport boss Toto Wolff’s claim that he saw Red Bull CVs cross his desk in the midst of the team’s early-season off-track drama, Horner hit back saying: “We’ve taken 220 people, 220 out of HPP into Red Bull Powertrains.”

That list moving from HPP over to Red Bull includes former HPP head of mechanical engineering Ben Hodgkinson who joined Red Bull Powertrains as their Technical Director, as well as chief engineer Phil Prew, head of manufacturing Steve Blewett and electronics team leader Omid Mostaghimi.

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