DS Virgin Racing today announced that Alex Tai has stepped down as team principal and CEO of the Formula E race-winning team.
Tai has left “to focus on his other business activities”, according to a statement released by the team.
A new team principal will be announced for the new season, due to start in December in Riyadh. Until then chief technology officer Sylvain Filippi will become the chief operating officer and will be in charge of the everyday running of the team, with Tai remaining as an advisor until the end of the season.
“DS Virgin Racing today announces that Alex Tai is stepping down as Team Principal and CEO to focus on his other business activities. A new team principal will be announced before the start of season five,” read a statement from DS Virgin.
“In the meantime, Sylvain Filippi, has been promoted to Chief Operations Officer, and will oversee both the racing activities and day-to-day operations of the business. Alex will remain as an advisor to the team until the end of the season.
“DS Virgin Racing would like to thank Alex as one of the founders of the team for his work in guiding it through four seasons culminating in the many track successes we have achieved in that time. We wish him well with his future endeavours.”
The DS Virgin team announced in April that a majority share of the team had been bought by renewable energy company giant Envision, alongside the target to become carbon neutral.
Virgin is set to part ways with DS at its backing manufacturer at the end of the current FE campaign, with the French marque moving to Techeetah for the 2018/19 season, which will be FE’s first with Gen2 machinery.
