INFINITI has reaffirmed once again its long-term technical partnership with the Renault Sport Formula One Team at the team's 2017 race car unveil and driver line up presentation in London on Thursday. Following the successful debut of the Infiniti and Renault Sport Racing collaboration in 2016, the newly launched R.S.17 introduces for the first time the Infiniti co-developed second generation Energy Recovery System (ERS). This new generation ERS has been developed by the team together with a group of Infiniti Performance Hybrid technology engineers based at the Renault Sport Racing powertrain R&D facilities in Viry-Châtillon (France), and will be in use from the upcoming 2017 season. "Performance Hybrid technology is one of Infiniti's major strengths," said Tommaso Volpe, Infiniti Global Motorsport Director. "We launched our first performance hybrid car in 2011 and we were the first car manufacturer to use this technology to boost performance rather than to reduce consumption; so when the Renault Sport Formula One Team decided to develop their ERS technology in-house, Infiniti emerged as the perfect partner to support them, as part of the Renault-Nissan Alliance. "We are gaining invaluable experience in Performance Hybrid technology as a result of the collaboration with the Team, and this experience is being transferred back to our core business to improve future technology." Cyril Abiteboul, Managing Director of the Renault Sport Formula One Team, also commented: "The Energy Recovery System element of our Formula 1 Power Unit is extremely complex and INFINITI has brought significant experience and expertise in hybrid technology to the team. The INFINITI engineers based in our facilities are working very closely with our engineering team and playing a key role in extracting the maximum possible performance from our ERS." In addition to its expertise in Performance Hybrid technology, INFINITI also brings an international diversity of young, fresh-thinking engineering talent to the Renault Sport Formula One Team through its highly successful Infiniti Engineering Academy. The 2017 will be the fourth edition of this global recruitment program that offers engineering students from all over the world a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to join a unique automotive-to-Formula 1 placement, thanks to the technical partnership and collaboration between the two companies. In fact, a key pillar of the Infiniti Engineering Academy is exploring crossover opportunities and the sharing of technology between Infiniti road car and Renault Sport Formula One Team race car projects. "For Infiniti this is very strategic collaboration: we are part of the Renault-Nissan Alliance and with this partnership we extend the important technical synergy of the Alliance also to Formula 1, generating together R&D on hybrid technology", Volpe noted.
