Virgin Eyes Audi Power for Season Five

Virgin Racing has started the process to secure a customer Audi Formula E powertrain in Season Five, e-racing365 can reveal.

The plans, which are believed to be agreed in principal but not contractually confirmed, could see Virgin become Audi’s first ever Formula E customer.

Virgin Racing has worked with DS Performance as an official technical partner since Season Two in 2015/16.

Known as DS Virgin Racing, the team has won four races since the start of the partnership. Sam Bird has been responsible for all four victories: Buenos Aires in Season Two, a brace at New York in Season Three and the opening Season Four encounter in Hong Kong.

The DS/Virgin alliance is set to come to an end later this year, as DS will become a Manufacturer in its own right and partner with TECHEETAH which will become a customer of DS. This multi-year deal is likely to be fully announced in March.

As Virgin Racing did not apply to be a registered manufacturer for Season Five, they put themselves in a position which Team Principal Alex Tai described to e-racing365 as “going wherever it likes for Season Five.”

E-racing365 believes that destination is likely to be Audi after they were obliged to supply cars when approached by Virgin Racing in order to be in compliance with the Sporting Regulations.

These dictate that as well as the “cars”, two full spare part kits (minus battery and survival cell) must be made available to Virgin Racing for at least the €817,300 price capped amount. Manufacturers may give discounts to teams if they wish to.

Tai would not be drawn on his teams’ plans for next season when approached by e-racing365 in Marrakesh earlier this month, saying only that “we will announce news officially when the time is right for the team and our stakeholders”, but acknowledged the team had “options.”

Audi Formula E chief Allan McNish was equally reticent to confirm any customer deal when contacted by e-racing365, saying: “We know we have to supply if someone comes forward.”

“We have a good car and we have a good package, whether that is attractive for customer teams then you would have to ask them.”

Virgin is also believed to have considered a Mahindra powertrain, and this partnership could still occur if a contract with Audi is not rubber-stamped in the coming weeks.

The Mahindra powertrain has been used by Spark Technologies in designing the new Spark SRT-05 Formula E design to define the parameters around the architecture for the second generation design.

A Mahindra powertrain has also been used throughout the test and development phase of the new car.