Lotus Racing has confirmed the appointment of Mark Smith to the role of Technical Director, completing the Malaysian team’s senior technical structure. Reporting to Chief Technical Officer Mike Gascoyne, Mark will start at the end of his Force India notice period, and joins fellow crossovers Lewis Butler (Chief Designer) and Marianne Hinson (Head of Aerodynamics), also from Force India.
These appointments, alongside Keith Saunt (Chief Operating Officer), Dieter Gass (Deputy Technical Director), Elliot Dason-Barber (Head of Vehicle Dynamics), Frank Ramowsky (Head of R&D), Rob Reeve (Head of Electronics) and Jody Egginton (Chief Engineer), make up the technical senior management structure.
“I’m exceptionally pleased to welcome Marianne and Lewis to Lotus Racing, and I’m very excited to once again be teaming up with Mark Smith who I have previously worked with at Jordan, Renault and Force India. Lewis and I were together at Force India, and Lewis also worked with Mark Smith at Red Bull, and Marianne and I have known each other since 1999 when I gave her her first job in F1 at Jordan, so we all know each other very well,” Gascoyne said.
“For me, it’s not just about the proven technical ability of the team we now have in place, it’s also the fact we’ve all worked together before, know how to achieve the goals we’ve set out, and know how to have fun together. We all work together extremely well, and that gives us the perfect base from which to build for long-term success,” the pleased technical head went on.
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I have a sneaky suspicion that these appointment will have “something to do” with the recent legal suit brought by Force India on Lotus for infringement of intellectual property rights, where Force India alleges that Lotus utilised its designs.
According to some, there’s a sneaky suspicion that Force India’s lawsuit on Lotus & Aerolab, the wind tunnel design facility stems from the fact that Force India’s dues to the company are up. Maybe FI’s trying to pull a fast one on Aerolab and have that debt wiped out.
“I’m exceptionally pleased to welcome Marianne and Lewis to Lotus Racing, and I’m very excited to once again be teaming up with Mark Smith who I have previously worked with at Jordan, Renault and Force India. Lewis and I were together at Force India, and Lewis also worked with Mark Smith at Red Bull, and Marianne and I have known each other since 1999 when I gave her her first job in F1 at Jordan, so we all know each other very well,” Gascoyne said.
if malaysian ppl did this, sure kena maki kroni one….
hahaha..u know already huh?..i agree..
In fact this does sound like the white people version of “kronisism”! He got his friends together to enjoy himself at the expense of our malaysian team, after all, malaysians quite stupid, white man say anything sure correct… looks like this orang putihs making use of his powers, after all he hasn’t got a bright record…
haiyoo…i hope do not used duit rakyat paying this summons..breach of intelect property is serious offence..
Actually its between Aerolab and Force India problem. It emerged last November that Force India was concerned a wind tunnel model of new team Lotus’ 2010 car strongly resembled its own 2009 racer. Aerolab initially hit back at the reports, revealing that it was in fact pursuing Force India in the courts after “serious and persistent breaches of contract”.
No wonder Force India slammed Lotus with intellectual property rights sue because many of their top officers / designers went to Lotus. Next year maybe Lotus will be side by side with Force India in term of performance or even better. Just wait and see the outcome from this migration.
i “HOPE” this will at least get Lotus in the points winning position next year.. or all those ppl are just Names, like John, Dick and Harry…
wish airasia boss made a good decision employing these guys.
why dont they bring in ex toyota f1 employee too? their car last year wasnt bad at all.
then they will also kena lawsuit from Stefan GP…
Have you seen Stefan GP’s website? Quite bad shape..haha! But no word from him on joining the 2011 line up though
macam tony saja roped in all sama gang : ) but at least they have the expertise.
where are the locals?
probably the locals haven’t reached or acquired the relevant expertise to be considered for the job. i believe everyone in the paddock more or less holds a PhD in automotive engineering. probably the lollipop man has one too… :-)
These are all senior/head roles. Maybe the locals are a little lower down the line (hopefully there’re a few)?
And I hope they’ll do a good job at Lotus like they did in Force India. Just make sure the Lotus car doesn’t look like the FI. :-)
Have to accept the fact that the locals are still learning. Hopefully they will make full use of the opportunity working under the “expert” to be expert themselves in 5-10 years to come. By then we could have an F1 team that is majority made up of M’sian. Just hope that Tony’s Lotus still exist then. Keep on believing, M’sia boleh!
There are currently a few junior engineers working at their factory. Some in aero dept, some in vehicle dynamics etc. There is a higher malaysian make up in their commercial dept
Are you sure they can help Lotus to increase their performance?
lol.. they getting sued now