Formula 1 team Alpine has confirmed that it will cut ties with French engine manufacturer Renault from 2026.
Alpine mentioned in a press release on Monday that its factory in Viry-Châtillon, a suburb of Paris, will become an engineering laboratory called “Hypertech Alpine”, starting at the end of 2024.
This will be used to design the future Alpine performance car as well as to develop batteries and electric motors, in addition to continuing its endurance and rally programs.
Renault will therefore leave F1 from 2026, when new regulations come into force.
However, the French engine manufacturer will continue to supply Alpine during the 2025 championship, and the monitoring unit of its new laboratory will have the mandate to oversee the development of the F1 program.
” She [l’unité de surveillance] will have the mandate to preserve the knowledge and skills of experts in this sporting discipline, in order to ensure that Hypertech Alpine’s various projects are at the forefront of innovation,” we could read in the press release. of the company.
In July, outgoing Alpine boss Bruno Famin said the team was considering changing engine manufacturers. Persistent rumors suggest that Mercedes will become Alpine’s supplier from 2026.
Renault was once a respected engine manufacturer in F1, and sold its engines to various teams, including Red Bull, which won four consecutive world championships in 2010 and 2013 thanks to German Sebastian Vettel.
Spaniard Fernando Alonso’s two world championships were also won with Renault, in 2005 and 2006.
The Alpine team, however, lacks speed and reliability this season.
Alpine Renault is ninth among the 10 teams entered in the constructors’ championship and its French drivers, Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon, have not scored a point in the last three races.