India, Feb. 6 -- Honda has hired Alex Baumgartel, co-founder of Kalex, to help them improve the development of their MotoGP chassis. This partnership expands on Honda's earlier work with Kalex, a well-known German technical company best known for its Moto2 involvement and chassis adoption throughout the circuit. Before this season, Honda had asked Kalex for a chassis for the RC213V, which was driven by Marc Marquez and Joan Mir. But the design seemed to have been mainly managed by HRC, even though Kalex was involved in the building process. The chassis was so identical to the regular version that the Honda riders didn't even know it had changed.

A major change in HRC's approach is suggested by Baumgartel's recent hiring. Given that Honda...