Luca de Meo, the architect of the Alpine Formula 1 project, will step down as the boss of its parent company Renault next month.
De Meo became CEO of the Renault Group in 2020 and initiated a plan to transform the fortunes of its various automotive brands.
A key part of that was producing new Alpine car models to make the niche brand a player in the electric vehicles market - and to that end, the Renault Sport division was merged with Alpine to create a new business unit.
Renault’s F1 team was rebranded in the Alpine name as a result, as was the engine facility in Viry-Chatillon.
De Meo has been credited for a successful Renault tenure as the company now has “a healthy foundation, boasts an impressive range of products and has resumed growth”, it said in a statement, while de Meo himself said “the results speak for themselves: they are the best in our history”.
But he has also essentially overseen a very poor part of its F1 history.
The French manufacturer scored its first victory since returning to F1 as a works team in 2016 in the 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix - but the Alpine era has been fraught with controversy and instability.
De Meo has rejigged the Alpine Cars and F1 leadership team on several occasions. Cyril Abiteboul, Marcin Budkowski, Otmar Szafnauer, Bruno Famin and Oliver Oakes have all had stints as team principal, while Flavio Briatore was brought in last June to be de Meo’s executive advisor.
That led to Famin being repurposed within the group, and Oakes being hired - although Oakes resigned for personal reasons in May, leaving Briatore to assume more public-facing ‘team principal’ duties even though he was already well established as the real person in charge.
Last year De Meo, with Briatore by his side, green-lit the abolition of the Alpine F1 engine programme, meaning the team will forfeit works status at the end of 2025 to become a Mercedes customer.
It was widely felt this was part of gradually making the team easier to sell, although de Meo said it would never happen on his watch and Briatore repeatedly denied it was on the cards too.
De Meo’s departure from Renault now creates two major questions for Alpine’s F1 team.
Will Renault’s board, and/or its new boss, consider a sale prudent given the significant increase in value the team has enjoyed - especially as its competitiveness on-track is at an all-time low, with Alpine last in the championship?
And what happens to Briatore, given he was recruited by de Meo to advise him, rather than take an official position within either the F1 team or Alpine/Renault as companies?
Briatore’s position has come under scrutiny in France, with a recent report claiming that his consultancy deal with de Meo earns him a significant percentage of commercial deals brought to Alpine, and effectively a salary that outdid even de Meo’s.
Renault’s board of directors has initiated the process of appointing a new CEO “based on the already defined succession plan”, a company statement said.
