For Briatore, Renault did nothing wrong

Renault’s team manager, Flavio Briatore, is sure that his team has done nothing wrong in this new espionage case involving the French team and the McLaren team.

The FIA stated that Renault will have to appear before the World Motor Sport Council to address the accusations against them. Indeed, for more than a year, the team allegedly possessed McLaren 2007 diagrams on various systems of the racing car.

Renault confirmed that a former McLaren engineer, Phil Mackereth, who joined Renault in September 2006, brought data with him on a computer disk. The team also stated that several engineers certainly saw this data.

However, Briatore insists that none of this data was used by Renault and that the team has nothing to hide.

« When we discovered in September this guy’s [Mackereth] actions, we launched an investigation and immediately suspended him, then we immediately informed McLaren and the FIA, » Briatore stated to the Times newspaper.

« We have provided the FIA and its President Max Mosley with all the evidence regarding this data and a statement from our engineers specifying that we have never used a system belonging to McLaren on our cars. »

The information was in the computer on the disks brought by this guy. It’s very simple. It was a drawing of a small number of systems, like the gearbox.

« I am convinced that the information was not used. We have statements from every engineer who was in contact with this data, and categorically everyone said that these drawings had no influence on the design of our car, » defended Briatore.

Briatore dismissed any comparison between this new case and the one involving McLaren and Ferrari during the year. And for good reason, the director of the French team does not want to think about the sanctions imposed on the British team. That is to say, exclusion from the constructors’ championship and a 100 million dollar fine.

The Italian stated to the press that, in the McLaren-Ferrari case, the passing of information was on a larger scale, whereas in the Renault case there was no continuous leak of information.

He also revealed that McLaren was invited to conduct a thorough investigation at Renault’s Enstone factory, but the security firm named by McLaren only made a brief visit to retrieve the disks.

« We were happy to let them inspect our computer, » Briatore stated.

« We wanted McLaren to accept this offer to give them the opportunity to verify that there was no influence on the design of our car, but they never accepted the invitation, » he concluded.