Williams Grand Prix Holdings plc has announced the appointment of Paddy Lowe as chief technical officer for the Williams Group, headquartered at Grove, near Wantage.
Lowe joins Williams today and will take overall management responsibility for the engineering operation at Grove. He will also join the company’s board of directors and take a shareholding in the company.
Lowe moves to Williams from current Formula One constructors’ champions Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, where he held the position of executive director (Technical) since June 2013 and helped lead the Mercedes team to record dominance in the drivers’ and constructors’ world championships.
Lowe began his F1 career with Williams in 1987 as a control systems engineer, working with Sir Patrick Head and Adrian Newey. In his six years with the team he helped pioneer the active suspension system that took Nigel Mansell to the 1992 World Championship in the FW14B. He then moved to McLaren in 1993 and spent two decades at the Woking-based team in the positions of head of research and development, chief engineer, engineering director and finally technical director.
During his 29 years in the sport, Lowe has contributed to 158 race wins, seven Drivers’ Championship titles and five Constructors’ Championship titles: an impressive CV making him one of the leading engineers in the F1 paddock.
Claire Williams, deputy team principal, said: “I am delighted that the team is welcoming Paddy back to Williams in the role of chief technical officer. Having someone of Paddy’s calibre and engineering competence is not only a morale boost for everyone at Williams, but I know it will also significantly support our efforts to return this team back to the front of the grid. Our ambitions at Williams are unwavering, we want to win races and championships, but to do that you need the best talent in the business. In Paddy we believe we have just that as well as a leader who will drive change. This is a game changer for us and once again makes us extremely excited about this team’s future.”