To what degree did Mitch Evans consult his friend and former teammate Nick Cassidy about signing a Stellantis mega deal to start a new phase of his career with Opel GSE Formula E team?
It is a tantalising question when you consider the two Kiwi’s respective journeys to getting to this very point of their careers.
Each has treaded the boards significantly at Jaguar. Cassidy much more briefly, but no less intensely between 2023 and 2025, while Evans’ own epoch has been a decade in the making from 2016 to the present summer.
They have given blood, sweat and tears to the ‘Big Cat’, yes. But more than that, each has earned their place at one of Formula E’s top tables. They have the trophies and they have the scars too. That they have ended up with the same employer (Stellantis) is as neat a symmetry as it is alluring for the new Gen4 era.
That is because the two are highly likely to be battling for the same prizes and occasionally the same bits of Formula E real estate on track too. Just two weeks ago the pair were in different races at London Excel with nothing owed to the other. Yet, the Kiwi and friendship alliance took hold and Cassidy did his mate a big favour when he overtook Nico Mueller and compromised the Porsche in the Saturday race much to the fury of a watching Florian Modlinger.
So, how useful has Cassidy been for Evans as the two share a coffee in their adopted home of Monaco between races last spring?
“To a degree, yes (Cassidy has been useful) although obviously, it’s a different team but the same mother company (Stellantis),” Evans told Formula E Notebook at the launch of the Opel GSE Formula E team in Vienna yesterday.
“But culturally, it’s very different to what he was used to at Jaguar. It’s different in some ways. But there’s some areas that he thinks are really good and some areas that he wants to work on too.
“We’ve had a lot of chats about it because he obviously took the step a year before me. I spoke to him a lot to, let’s say, validate things, and I think that’s normal.”
Evans added that he and Cassidy were “best friends, so I did use him a bit to get to my decision and I’m looking forward to working closer to him again too, because he’s great to work with and technically incredible, so I’m looking forward to that.”
Cassidy was in a very similar place to the one Evans found himself in earlier this year. He effectively had the freedom of the paddock with multiple offers and possibilities. Cassidy’s quest came in early 2025 when he was taking some serious offers in, notably from Jay Penske.
But with Penske unable to tell him what he would be driving in Gen4 he elected for Stellantis, which had the added bonus of a WEC seat and a long-term deal.
Fast forward 12 month to the spring of 2026 and Evans made a not dissimilar decision. He would go Stellantis too with a shiny new brand in Opel, albeit with initially less capacity to make it a double programme. But in time that possibility may come up for him.
Each of them have landed impeccably and will be in a very good position to make Gen4 their own in terms of leading their respective teams. Evans and Cassidy co-existed at Jaguar but it never felt like something that would be a long-term fixture and sure enough it only lasted two seasons, both of which had tasty stress tests.
Now, the fact each of them are stablemates as opposed to teammates, it feels if anything more stable because they can use their respective skills to push Stellantis on further through achievements that won’t cross the streams as much as they would if they shared one garage.
Cassidy’s re-assurance that the Stellantis way of doing things was not so much key for Evans but a nice added bonus.
“If there were any big red flags, I wouldn’t be probably here today,” he said. “Because I trust his (Cassidy’s) opinion and he’s clearly quite happy there (at Citroen) and he’s looking forward to Gen4.”
And well he might. Because with a trusted and proven Formula E great in the same stable as a bright young star (Theo Pourchaire) and a veteran with a post-Gen3 point to prove (Jean-Eric Vergne) the Stellantis quartet look like a tough unit to break down in Gen4 already.
Additional reporting by Anthony Rowlinson
