Ferrari chairman and CEO Sergio Marchionne says the Italian outfit is paying the price for "ignoring" the quality of its components, but is confident the issue will be resolved and they will catch Mercedes in the final four races.
Ferrari has been hit by a number of reliability issues lately which has scuppered Sebastian Vettel's hopes of securing a fifth title as Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton has opened up a huge 59-point lead.
Vettel was unable to qualify in Malaysia after a turbo pipe cracked – the same issue hit team-mate Kimi Raikkonen at the start of the same race and he retired on the spot – and the German then retired on lap six of the Japanese GP due to a faulty spark plug.
Marchionne insists these "nonsense" failures will be addressed immediately.
"It was a technical nonsense that had an impact on a car that costs millions of euros," Marchionne told Italy's CNBC.
"We must renew our commitment regarding the quality of the components coming to F1. It's a problem we've probably ignored over time because it was never of much importance.
"But now we've had at least three occasions where we've really seen the devastating impact on performance. We'll fix it."
Marchionne is confident Ferrari can close up to Mercedes in the final four races of the season, despite a 145-point gap in the Constructors' Championship.
"Without being arrogant, I think it [our car] is at the same level if not better than Mercedes today," he added. "I'm sure if we'd not had any problems like in the last three races, we would be having a different discussion.
"I'm delighted with what the team has done and I have tremendous confidence that in the next four races we will be able to close most of the Mercedes gap."
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