Lewis Hamilton will be reunited with Mercedes colleagues at Ferrari next year after the Italian team recruited two former leading figures from the Silver Arrows paddock.
Belgian Jerome D’Ambrosio, who has stood in for Mercedes Formula 1 boss Toto Wolff and overseen their young driver programme, has agreed to take on a similar role at Ferrari.
French engineer Loic Serra will also join the sport’s most famous team, where he has been named head of chassis performance.
Both men are on gardening leave ahead of an official joining date in October, just weeks before seven-time champion Hamilton makes his eagerly anticipated switch.
The signings are the latest bold moves made by Ferrari principal Frederic Vasseur, who has shaken up the team since arriving ahead of last season.
Vasseur is also reported to have held talks with Red Bull design guru Adrian Newey, who is leaving the team he helped to make the sport’s dominant force next year.
Former McLaren and Williams designer Newey’s cars have won 13 drivers’ championships and 12 constructors’ titles since the 1990s, including half a dozen of each at Red Bull.
But the Englishman, 65 – dubbed “a true legend” by boss Christian Horner – announced this month that he was leaving the team after 19 years to seek “new challenges”.
A move to Ferrari would arguably be Vasseur’s biggest coup yet as he looks to assemble a team capable of winning the team’s first titles since 2008.