Thierry Koskas appointed by Renault as head of Formula 1 programme
On January 1, Frenchman Koskas will replace Renault Sport president Jerome Stoll, as the team seeks to close the gap on Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull.
Renault’s target is to ensure the team can "race with the best and contest the title" by 2021.
Koskas' appointment comes at a time when most senior personalities in the sport believe Renault face existential questions about their participation in F1.
Currently, they are spending about 60-70% of the budgets of world champions Mercedes and their closest competitors Ferrari and Red Bull.
And while Renault will finish the 2019 season in fourth place, their car has been on average of 1.7 seconds a lap off the pace, and at times has been lapped by the Red Bulls, which this campaign use the same Renault engine as the factory team.
Initially, Ghosn was sold on the idea of Renault owning their own team again on the basis of spending no more money than their current budget.
F1 bosses are in the midst of discussions with the teams aimed at introducing cost control and a budget cap, but that is unlikely to kick start on any significant level in time for 2021.
Renault could therefore settle for the difficult choice of either waiting for the the cost-control measures to kick in and accepting that they might take longer to achieve their targets or accepting they are unlikely to catch the top three teams at their current level of spending, increasing their budget to a level they did not initially want to.
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