McLaren has committed to Nissan for the rest of Formula E’s Gen3 era, taking the partnership through to 2026.
Though the deal was originally identified as covering the full Gen3 period when McLaren secured Nissan as its technical supplier for its FE debut, clauses within the deal would have allowed McLaren to break away had it deemed it necessary.
Confirmation that this won’t happen means there is set to be only one change in the manufacturer/customer supply deals for 2025 and 2026.
The Abt Cupra team has already ceased its deal with Mahindra beyond the present campaign and will run with alternative power for 2025.
Abt is known to be in discussions with Porsche about a potential deal, although other options also exist.
Envision and Andretti will again partner with Jaguar and Porsche respectively, while Maserati is expected to stay with Stellantis brand relatives DS Automobile.
There is less certainty about the future status of the NIO 333 manufacturer registration. The team element, now known as ERT, is presently still attempting to secure its future in the championship beyond this season.
WHY MCLAREN’S STICKING WITH NISSAN
McLaren FE team principal Ian James recently told The Race that “the intention from the beginning was to work together with Nissan throughout Gen3” and that it is still “very much the intention and we're very pleased with the collaboration that we've had so far”.
The partnership has so far brought pole positions (Jake Hughes’ brace of top spots in Diriyah and Monaco in 2023) and a podium (Rene Rast in Diriyah last season) for McLaren.
But on average both it and Nissan’s factory team have only been upper-midfield runners in the Gen3 era so far, with the Nissan package often unable to translate strong one-lap pace into longer-run performance in 2023.
Nissan has made significant changes to its operation since breaking from its previous structure with the e.dams concern, which founded and built the operation in 2014 in partnership with Nissan's sister brand Renault.
It appointed former Spark Racing Technology technical leader Theophile Gouzin last summer, while its mainstay technical leader Vincent Gaillardot will leave next month to join the technical team at the FIA.
Nissan will also officially move into new premises in Paris E ahead of its anticipated commitment into the Gen4 Formula E era.
James also believes McLaren and Nissan will be able to improve their performances together.
“Both ourselves and Nissan know that we've got a lot of work to do to close the gap to the competition, and as you can imagine development work for season 11, for the second amount of homologation for Gen3, is well underway,” he said.
“We've been very much kept up to speed with the progress on that.
“So we are looking forward to continuing that relationship, both for next season and beyond.”
From Nissan’s standpoint, team principal Tommaso Volpe says that the relationship with McLaren “is really very good” and that “we work really, really transparently very well together and we share positive feedback, negative feedback, like partners - the same way I would do internally in my own team. So, I think it is working well.”
