Former F1 boss Ross Brawn, who has been charged to look after the technical and sporting development for Liberty Media, wants to attract more manufacturers into F1.
Despite the recent news announcing Sauber re-name to Alfa Romeo, the reality is that the move is as a new title sponsor rather than an actual manufacturer coming into the sport. Ferrari will simply re-badge their engine to sister company Alfa Romeo under the Fiat Chrysler umbrella.
New owners Liberty are after bigger fish. More races, more teams, more spectacle, more of everything. If successful, they’d change the sport as we know it but so far very little has actual changed.
Charged with the task is Ross Brawn who’s name has been synonymous with success in F1 in the past. Indeed successes, admiration and creditability has been the driving force behind Liberty’s decision to appoint Brawn, despite his inaction during the FIA’s ‘official’ and feeble investigation into Jules Bianchi’s fatal crash at Suzuka 2014. Yet his reputation still carries significant weight and the new owners want premium manufacturers involved in the future.
Brawn has been quoted in the German press as saying that “There are several premium manufacturers I would like to be in Formula One , Porsche is one of them, but also Aston Martin and Lamborghini.”
It is obvious that the state of the current engine regulations do not permit new entries. The cost of development far too high and the continued dominance shown by Mercedes makes any kind of return on investment, simply not feasible.
“We need to create an environment that’s attractive to them.” admits Brawn.
“I guarantee you: With today’s power unit, no manufacturer is interested in getting started. That’s why we need to make it cheaper and easier, “
Music to the ears of Red Bull and Spice boy Horner no doubt.
Lets just see how well Liberty and Brawn do getting the juggernauts that are Mercedes and Ferrari to agree.
Porsche and Lamborghini.are effectively both owned by WV, so there’s little / no chance both would build an F1 engine. Aston Martin mostly relies on M-B for engines in its cars and is barely profitable – good luck hoping they’ll spend millions on an F1 engine no matter what it costs.
The reality is that M-B, Ferrari and Renault, with their customers, have enough votes in the Strategy Group to decide the way any new engine spec will go. And I doubt Honda want to have to start from scratch again either.
There will be some tinkering to simplify the engines and reduce costs, but fundamentally what we have today is what we’ll have in 2021.
As for Horner – Red Bull are nothing more than privateers and he doesn’t like sitting on the outside looking in while the manufacturers decide what will happen.
If we have the same engines in 2021 as we do now, then God help us all.
The days of F1 as a competitive sport will be well and truly gone, along with the majority of the smaller independent teams, who won’t be able to afford to give millions of pounds of their budgets to the ‘fat cats’ at Mercedes and Ferrari for their ridiculously complicated, boring and quiet PU’s (they’re not even referred to as engines any more.)
#RIP F1
Yeah f1 lost the way when they ‘had’ to call an engine a PU. Soft, lame and boring.
Oh and an engine is not an ICE either.
While im in the mood…..this politically correct nomenclature aroind engines is hilarious. Is it supposed to be more ‘green’ now? Because we also got rid of bridgestone tyres that could run a race and replaced them with many sets of pirellis….hows the carbon footprint of sending them around.
It just annoys me because its obviously hypocritical and all for the sake of branding and perception. Problem is too many F1 fans are not totally stupid but are tuning out from this once great sport.
At first the Sauber – Alfa deal sounded exciting: Alfa Romeo back in F1!! And then it sank in: it is nothing more than a sponsorship deal. Marchionne can later decide to just “let it go” when the going gets tough. Nothing really connecting Alfa with Sauber except for the (very pretty) livery. Sauber already had the Ferrari engine. They might get a thing or 2 more, but I still have this feeling of artificialness..
If Aston or Lambo will follow, I think it will be on a same basis. Aston will (be allowed to) rebrand a Mercedes engine. I can’t see VW doing a deal with Mercedes, Ferrari or Honda, but I would expect Renault is open for a deal.
Will this add to the excitement? Not for the F1 die-hards. Cap-buying yokels will probably love it. For me it would only prove the Indy-fication of the sport.
We need Toyota back, we need BMW back, we need Ford back and we need Chinese manufacturers to get involved
“We need Toyota back, we need BMW back, we need Ford back……”
All of them are doing well financially without F1 – I doubt any of them see a rational business model for getting back into F1 and all are active, especially Toyota and Ford, in other forms of motorsport which are more in tune with corporate philosophy. The other thing is with only 10 teams being aligned with an existing manufacturer is critical now. No one wants to do what McLaren did with Honda and get a dud engine for 3 years.
The 10 team thing is indeed an issue. 4 engine manufacturers for 10 teams already is a lot. If it were up to me, F1 would go back to 12 teams, or even 13 if physically possible on a circuit.
As for doing financially well: so would Mercedes, Renault and Honda without F1. If brands simply don’t have a racing itch, then there is nothing F1 could do about it.
Yes, F1 is a worldwide platform and yes, I truly believe it could add something for a brand. But there are other ways to sell cars. Ford, PSA and General Motors do well without it, and so do all Asian brands (only exception is Honda, and they have that racing itch)
Part of the issue is the price of that itch. Even VW wants cars to go fast, even before their take-over of Porsche. They are balking at the price tag though.
So… we need something cheap enough that more manufacturers want to compete, we need something expensive enough that not not every Tom, Dick and Harry think they need to get in. We need a culture where there is no shame in losing, but where it is worth wanting to win. We need regulations that will equalize the field so companies can have a realistic wish to invest 3 years into F1 racing with a reasonable chance of success.
Brawn can sharpen his teeth on the contradictions in here.
You’ll never see 12 or 13 teams in F1 again as Liberty won’t extend the payout to them – unless all the other existing teams agree to dilute their payout, and that won’t happen.
Ah the season is over . As a Long time F1 viewer this year has been a yawn and disappointing and this looks like continuing and if we have to suffer a piece of new hardware/ software to predict overtaking and action I’m out of here . The current cars are too complex . The tyres win the strategy race , the noses stop close overtakes , the over complex engines are detached from daily reality, and DRS zones are artificial , it’s all bollocks and the good old DFV days , yes I know you can’t go back , we’re the best ,
So it’s off to historics for me .