Williams chief technical officer Paddy Lowe says it is "absolutely possible" for his new team to win Formula One titles as a Mercedes customer team.
After helping steer the team to three consecutive world championships Lowe left his role at Mercedes to join Williams, a job he officially started on the eve of this weekend's Australian Grand Prix. The role comes with a position on Williams' board of directors, giving him greater authority than he enjoyed at Mercedes, where he was head of the technical operation only.
The move is a bold one given Mercedes' recent dominance and Williams' comparatively limited resources, as well as the notion it is difficult for a customer team to win championships in the V6 turbo era. That idea was one of the main reasons for McLaren dropping Mercedes engines in 2015 in favour of Honda power, but it is a viewpoint not shared by Lowe.
When asked if it is possible in modern F1 for customer teams to win, Lowe pointed to the Red Bull example, saying: "Yes. I mean the engines are actually all the same between the different Mercedes teams, they are supposed to be between all engine suppliers. So it's absolutely possible to win a championship. There's no better example of that than Red Bull who have done very well with the Renault engine when they were not classified as a works team."
Williams hopes the arrival of Lowe will help rectify its recent development struggles, something which contributed to being beaten to fourth position by Force India in 2016. Despite the financial limitations at Williams, Lowe is relishing the chance to help turn the team's fortunes around.
"It's a great opportunity, I think that's the simplest way to put it. We achieved incredible things at Mercedes in three years and, of course, they may continue to do so. I'm very proud of the part I played in that set of championships, but for me personally a great opportunity came up at Williams and I'm very excited about it.
"It's been discussed many times the disparity of funding between teams in the pitlane so clearly it's more difficult to compete at the front when you have less money, nobody will deny that. The challenge here is to make the most efficient use we can with the resources we have.
"In parallel you're constantly trying to gain access to more resources that's what drives success in this sport. Do a good job, generate more income so you can do an even better job. If we want to move forward we have to move forward technically and then financially when you make all of those factors contribute together."
When asked if he was looking for any former Mercedes colleagues to join him at Williams, he said: "I think my answer to that is that there's great people in the team already. I don't think the game here is about coming in and saying right we need to ship in a bunch of superstars.
"Every team has got great people in it and you have narrow margins you're working with. It's about getting that team to work together on the right things. People ask me all the time what was the secret to Mercedes' success and while you can't pin it down to a simple answer but if you did it would be teamwork."