Is the marriage between Renault and Caterham over before they've even launched a car? That's the scenario reported by
Autocar
on the weekend based on rumours they've heard that the two are no longer working together.
Sports car was to be built at Dieppe; what now?
We've been closely following this unlikely partnership ever since it was
announced in 2012
so we dutifully rang them both to find out. "There's no comment I can make," the Caterham spokesman told us, while Renault was no more forthcoming: "I can't tell you a thing." Not exactly confidence inspiring.
A brief backgrounder: the two formed a 50:50 partnership called the Societe des Automobiles Alpine Caterham (SAAC) to jointly produce a car at Renault's old Alpine base in Dieppe, northern France, that would also resurrect the old French sporting badge.
There's been no solid information on what form the car will take, but we got a good idea from Bernard Ollivier, MD of Renaultsport Technology, who told us in 2013 it would use off-the-shelf parts, including the likely use of a 1.6-litre turbo petrol from Renault. But he warned it wouldn't be plain sailing. "It's not difficult to make a sports car. It's quite easy. The difficulty we have is to be profitable," he told us.
"No comment" the official line from Caterham
Rumours emerged
of a rift back in February this year, blamed on 'creative tension' between the two brands. As we suggested then, it was easy to believe the momentum had gone out of the project when Renault's petrolhead boss Carlos Tavares left the company in September last year.
We've also had no evidence yet that Caterham can extend its brand appeal beyond its enduring Seven range, despite ambitious plans for SUVs, city cars and even motorbikes announced by Malaysian tycoon owner Tony Fernandes.
Even a brand with a solid sports-car heritage like Toyota can't seem to kickstart the ailing lightweight coupe market with the acclaimed GT86, last year selling just over 6,000 in Europe compared to the 15,000 it planned to.
Autocar's sources seemed to think that the Renault/Caterham split didn't mean the project was dead for good, and we really hope they will separately keep to the planned 2016 production date. Assuming of course that access to the offspring is split amicably between the two.