New Anglo-French board for Renault F1

Following the departure of Jean-Jacques His, Taillieu has been appointed as Renault F1's chief engine designer, and Bernard Dudot has been appointed as Briatore's deputy MD. Project manager Jean-Philippe Mercier will continue the development of the lowline 2003 engine in Viry while, at Enstone, a small engine division - Engine Development UK (formerly TWR Engines - will be managed by Pascal Tribotte.

Briatore said: "Our objective is to design an engine that can respond to the demands of the new regulations, imposing one engine per race weekend - that's 750km - while maintaining our performance targets. Basically, this will be a high-performance engine, reliable for practice and the race. In order to guarantee reliability. it will have a 'traditional' architecture, but without any increase in weight. It will have a high level of performance because it will benefit significantly from the technological solutions that Viry has developed over the past three years. The innovative expertise of Viry means that we will be able to develop a one-weekend engine with weight and performance equal to those of an engine designed to last half the distance."