[1] Ellis' motorsport career began in 1988, achieving success with numerous teams in various categories, in positions ranging from leading the development of Super Touring cars to WRC 4WD transmissions.

He gained prominence by participating in the Williams team's program for the British Touring Car Championship (BTCC), when he worked with Williams Renault Dealer Racing on the 1995 touring car project, the Renault Laguna, who dominated the 1997 season with Alain Menu at the wheel and, in 2000, he and Menu were together again at Prodrive, champions of the World Rally Championship, where Ellis designed the Ford Mondeo that Menu drove to the last BTCC championship before the series went through a radical regulation change.

[8] Ellis then took on a new challenge at Red Bull Racing as the chief vehicle performance engineer, a position he held until the end of the 2013 season, winning the constructors and drivers titles from 2010 to 2013 with the Austrian outfit.

[4][9] In December 2013, Mercedes announced the hiring of Mark Ellis where he would assume the position of performance director, returning to Brackley in June 2014.

[10][11] In July 2018, it was announced that Mark Ellis would step down from Mercedes, and take a sabbatical while Loïc Serra would replace him as performance director.