- 24 Nov 09, 18:27#171929
Carlos Ghosn has been in India of late and talking to representatives of Forbes Magazine in India. A full interview with the Renault-Nissan boss will appear in the first week of December but some of his remarks are already online and these are deeply worrying with regard to the Formula 1 world. Ghosn was asked how important Formula 1 is for Renault.
“F1 is one of the most-seen spectacles in the world,” he said. “It is facing some challenges: Challenges on how fair it is and how do you marry F1 with the environmental concerns. Can you bring zero emission through technology? So there are lots of questions about F1.”
How fair it is? Well, Monsieur Ghosn. You seem to have forgotten the concession that the teams made last winter when your team was whinging about not being able to develop its engine. Renault was allowed to do that. Remember? Oh, I guess the unfair thing is because Renault got banged to rights over Singapore in 2008. Still I would argue that F1 was very fair to Renault. It threw Flavio Briatore out of the sport but gave the manufacturer the benefit of the doubt. Now it seems Ghosn is trying to make out that F1 has treated Renault badly. Oh, and let us not talk about the McLaren data that turned up at Renault at the end of 2007 to which the FIA turned a very blind eye. Fair? Renault should market a model called the Houdini, in recognition of the company’s close shaves in F1.
The interviewers kept on with the same theme and asked whether Ghosn thought F1 was going to be important for Renault?
“I don’t think it is going to be very important for anybody, if it doesn’t answer some of the concerns that surround F1,” he said. “I notice that in the last year, three car manufacturers have bowed out of F1. Three in one year! That means there are a lot of questions that we need to resolve.”
Bad news, Mr Ghosn. The question that need to be resolved are in your neck of the woods. People are not buying cars. Formula 1 might help to sell some more and give Renault a better image than it currently has.
The latest remarks are going to set alarm bells ringing in Enstone and at Viry-Chatillon and one can imagine that any employee of Renault F1 who has the opportunity to take another job elsewhere will now go down that route, rather than sticking around and hoping that the French company will have a little more gumption than Honda, BMW and Toyota. It seems that Ghosn is no different to other car makers and is already formulating excuses to use when he announces that Renault is getting out of F1.
We will see, but that is how it sounds. The bad news for Ghosn is if he tries to peddle this line, the F1 world is not going to respond well. Renault signed the Concorde Agreement and thus is legally bound to stay in F1 until 2012. It can break that agreement or sidestep it by trying to sell the team, but what does that say about the company?
It all goes to prove that when it comes to motorsport no manufacturer can be trusted. They should be used by the racers to get money and technology but teams are much better off being independent. They have more chance of survival that way.
