Renault keen to supply a second team

The French squad have not supplied two teams with a Renault-badged engine since 1997, when it supplied Williams and Benetton, but they have been approached by a number of independent teams about a 2007 customer deal.

Renault team principal Flavio Briatore said: "We are keen to supply a second team and we have ample capacity at Viry  [Renault's engine headquarters] to supply it. With homologated engines coming in, supplying a second team has to be the way to go.

"It would offset a lot of the cost. We would be willing to talk to anyone and the engines would be available for a very reasonable price."

Renault's RS26 2.4-litre V8, designed under the guidance of engine technical chief Rob White, has proven to be one of the best engines in F1 this year. Renault are the only team not to have suffered an engine failure this season and the V8 is fully competitive in terms of power, compared with rival motors.

Technical director Bob Bell admitted: "There have been plenty of people knocking on the door and asking for our engines. There seems to be a bit of flux amongst the teams that might need an engine and we are always willing to talk to people."

A customer engine deal would be likely to cost around $15m per season, although if homologated 'frozen spec' engines have been introduced by 2007 that figure could be considerably reduced.

With Williams having agreed a three-year deal with Toyota from next season, the remaining candidates for an engine deal are Red Bull Racing, Scuderia Toro Rosso, Midland and Super Aguri.

Red Bull Racing currently have a Ferrari customer engine contract for next year, while Red Bull's junior team Toro Rosso have a 2007 Cosworth contract.

Autosport understands, however, that the contracts are interchangeable between the two teams, potentially allowing next year's STR-02, which is likely to be a developed version of this year's RB2 car, to use the Ferrari engines around which the chassis was designed.

Under that scenario, Red Bull could be in the market for another engine if they did not wish to renew a partnership with Cosworth - the engine manufacturer they dumped in favour of Ferrari at the end of last season.

Midland will also be seeking a new engine partner to replace Toyota, who have been their supplier since 2005. Toyota boss John Howett said the team had neither the desire nor the capacity to supply more than one team in addition to their factory squad.

There has also been speculation that Super Aguri, set up with Honda backing to provide a race seat for Takuma Sato, may yet split with Honda. Super Aguri managing director Daniel Audetto has close links with Briatore and is said to have had outline talks about a future Renault engine supply.