united spirits Archives

Nurburgring lifeline, Consistancy analysis, Vettel yellow flag storm brewing in Italy, Kingfisher Airlines finally finished, Champagne & Hot Dogs in Milton Keynes

May 10, 2015November 28, 2012 by The Judge

Vote for thejudge13 at the Silverstone media awards. “Best F1 blogger” is the category if you think we are. (Link). It only takes about 1 minute to do. I believe we have 14 votes so far from thjudge13 readers.

Nurburgring: My favourite subject, the 2013 F1 calendar. It’s a week for lifelines, first HRT and now Nurburgring. To cut a long story short, in February the operators of the circuit, NAG, were given an eviction notice for non-payment of rent. Today Motorsport are reporting this matter is now ‘settled’ – how or by whom we don’t know.

2 weeks ago a spokesman for NAG said, “Formula 1 is no more at the Nurburgring”, discussions with Ecclestone were cancelled and all the other 2013 events were at risk.

Today, “Now we have to make progress in the talks with the Bernie Ecclestone toward a contract”, said Thomas Schmidt of NAG. I presume the operating company had been declared insolvent or bankrupt and the original contract is therefore no longer in force. Anyway, good luck lads – Bernie’s feeling a little down and unwanted at the moment, you may catch him in a rare moment of weakness.

Mallya charges dropped, but problems just beginning, Sir Jack Stewart talks sexy (Ugh), F1 opportunity for Porsche, F1 News and Links…

February 13, 2016October 18, 2012 by The Judge

Mallya: Boss of stricken Kingfisher Airlines – has bounced cheque charges dropped (business today), and has paid off his arrears on the airport fees – presumably because he has raised some cash from selling a chunk of United Spirits to Diageo (Mallya forced to sell). Before the champagne (Crystal we think) is cracked this may just be the beginning of Vijay’s problems, because everyone else who is owed money should have realised the way to get paid is to issue legal proceedings. Indian tax authorities who have not received the deducted tax deducted Kingfisher Airlines from their employees are beginning action – it may be some employees are technically liable themselves even thought the Mallya company has taken the money from them. (Economic Times). The Indian courts may find themselves very busy soon particularly if the author of “Is Vijay Mallya India’s worst businessman” is correct. (firstpost.com)

Mercedes: After being heavily criticised by Helmut Marco for recruiting 3 former team technical directors to head up sub-divisions of Mercedes F1 (link), it appears Ross Brawn has decided that he has enough his search for “art directors” and is looking for some “Indians” – less expensive candidates. Here is a link if you are an undergraduate and interested in taking a 1 year placement with the team. (Merc Grad Recruit). To be fair, an amazing opportunity.

Force India: How the tower of cards could collapse

April 16, 2015October 14, 2012 by The Judge

Over the past few days I’ve been asked many times and seen people enquiring on various F1 websites as to how much is an F1 team worth. Of course the answer is simple, different teams are worth vastly different amounts. An F1 team is a business venture – registered with a legal identity independent of any rich owner and subject to the business regulations from the statutory authority where they are registered.

Valuing a business

The way business ventures are valued is highly complex and sector/performance specific. There was old 3 times profit rule that was a fundamental when I studied Finance many years ago. Yet even this most simplistic valuation methodology is fraught with danger when you dig deeper. Is that profit before or after asset depreciation, asset goodwill, taxation, one off accounting entries of substance – I could go on..and on..and on…

I guess my favourite methodology which can be proved beyond doubt and its an old adage, which says “The value of something is best measured by how much someone is actually prepared to.”