Karun Chandhok has urged Mercedes to raid Red Bull’s technical department following the exits of several key staff members in recent years. The Silver Arrows are set to lose performance director Loic Serra at the end of the campaign, with the 51-year-old set to follow Lewis Hamilton to Ferrari.
The likes of Andy Cowell and James Vowles have also departed over the last few seasons, leaving Toto Wolff with the task of finding adequate replacements. Simone Resta, a former Ferrari designer, has already agreed to join Mercedes as their new strategic development director while David Nelson will reportedly be appointed from within to fill Serra’s role.
Chandhok, however, believes that Mercedes should be looking to poach some of Red Bull’s brightest minds with the aim of accelerating their bid to restore former glories.
“Every organisational structure will have gaps that need to be plugged,” he told Sky Sports F1. “They must feel, reading the press release, it sounds like Simone Resta is going to work alongside James on the overall structure of the team, rather than detailed design.
“What perhaps they need to understand is further down the food chain and in terms of detailed design, are there people at Red Bull who they can have? In the same way they lost Loic Serra to Ferrari, that’s quite a loss to them because Loic was highly rated at Brackley.”
Mercedes will be hoping to ensure a seamless transition behind the scenes when Serra follows Hamilton to Ferrari at the end of the season. The 51-year-old was the team’s chief vehicle dynamicist before taking up his current role and has been with Mercedes for much of their recent success.
It has been reported that Serra was unhappy with Mercedes’ design philosophy in 2022 and 2023, putting him at odds with former technical chief Mike Elliott. The latter’s replacement James Allison wanted Serra to form part of the team’s revamped leadership structure earlier this year, but the deal with Ferrari was already done.
The Silver Arrows are still reeling from their disastrous result at the Australian Grand Prix, where Hamilton suffered an engine failure and George Russell crashed out of the race on the final lap. They will be desperate to bounce back at the next opportunity by claiming a welcome haul of points when F1 returns to the iconic Suzuka circuit next weekend.
