Marussia team closes it's doors

[Jordan Wilkins]

After protracted work by the administrators and the false hope of a potential buyer for the Marussia team, it's sadly been announced today by the administrators FRP Advisory LLP that the team was to officially close, and it's 200 hundred staff had all been made redundant.

This news is a big blow to F1 on the eve of this weekend's Brazilian Grand Prix, and again will spark new debate on the need for both cost saving measures and a re-evaluation of the prize money distribution in F1. This news is especially shocking as the team appeared on a provisional 2015 F1 entry list under the Manor Grand Prix name only yesterday.

Geoff Rowley, the joint administrator, commented today " It goes without saying that it is deeply regrettable that a business with such a great following in British and world motorsport has had to cease trading and close its doors. Whilst the team made significant progress during its relatively short period of operation, operating a F1 team requires significant ongoing investment."

Rowley also added " The group was put into administration last month following a shortfall in on-going funding and the administration process provided a moratorium to allow for attempts to secure a long term viable solution for the company within in a very limited time-frame. Sadly no solution could be achieved to allow for the business to continue in its current form. We would like to thank all the staff for their support during this difficult process. The joint administrators will continue with their statutory duties to realise the assets of the business in the best interests of all the creditors. "

This example will hopefully lead to cost saving measures in F1, and is especially crushing for the team as they were set for a big rise in prize money from FOM and Bernie Ecclestone after their superb 9th place points finish at this year's Monaco Grand Prix. For everyone in the team this will be a hammer blow as they are now unemployed, although hopefully at least a vast majority will be able to find jobs in motorsport soon. On the other struggling team front, it now appears the administrators for the Caterham team are relying on fan support and donations to increase their chances of making the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in several weeks time. What are your thoughts on Marussia dissolving and how it came about?

 

[florence3099]

Not surprising, but sad nonetheless.

However, I hope that some of the displaced staff will find jobs with Manor GP.

 

[Georg Siebert]

Or that some staff can join in with Haas Racing, or whatever his team is now called.

Shame for the Sport for sure and that Jules & Max have to find a new drive as well.

 

[florence3099]

I think its hardly likely that Jules will be back in F1, unfortunately. Look at Kubica: Is he back? No.

 

[Chris]

With the money that Bernie spent bailing himself out of his bribery case, he could have bailed out both Marussia and Caterham 21 times.

 

[Chris]

I think its hardly likely that Jules will be back in F1, unfortunately. Look at Kubica: Is he back? No.

Jules's and Kubica's injuries are totally different, but having said that, the chances of Jules ever getting back behind the wheel of a road car, let alone a Formula One car are very low.
I pray that if he ever wakes up, he'll retain his quality of life.

 

[Steve Bird]

Sad times for F1.

 

[Pamela USA]

Teams always leave and come back. I'm sure we will see new teams in future. Maybe BMW gonna jump F1 wagon agin. I would like to see BMW,Honda or Toyota make run for F1. Who know's one day maybe. Yes this is sad day for F1 but not an end of F1.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

The difference is that there has "always" been teams ready to step in when one or two teams have had financial troubles, or the team have managed to continue. Stewart coming in when Forti went bust, BAR buying Tyrrell(or at least the entry, and running the team in 98), Toyota arriving when Prost went out. Then when Arrows went bust, we had no team ready to take over the entry. However Paul Stoddart somehow managed to keep Minardi afloat, with basically the 2002 car until 2005, when Red Bull wanted a B-team. Super Aguri was a "bonus" team when Honda poured in money in the sport. Then Kolles being able to keep Jordan,Midland,Spyker afloat long enough for Mallya to buy the team, and working there until the great 2009 season where Honda pulled out, and was barely saved by Brawn. Which in turn managed to get the team around the world on a shoestring budget, or, well, the couldn't even afford that. There was reports that Barrichello and Button had to be extra careful after Button being taken out at Spa as that made it hard to complete the season.
In 2010 we had 4 new teams, that turned into 3, then Toyota and BMW pulled out, with Peter Sauber buying back Sauber.

Then fast forward to 2014. We've lost the new teams (Caterham does look like a lost cause), we will 99% sure have 9 teams on the grid in 2015, with Forza Rosso and HAAS looking to get in. Forza Rosso is bascially the guys who "bought" Caterham, and is not on the entry list for 2015, and if Caterham is unable to crowd-source money to go to Abu Dhabi, the entry is lost, and there will be no Forza Rosso.

Then you add the fact that Red Bull have said since 2009 that Torro Rosso is avaible to buy (due to the extra cost of making 2 separate cars), Sauber have no money, and 4 drivers under contract for 2015 (Ericsson, Nasr, Vd Garde and Sutil), that will take some money to get sorted. Force India is the only team that have openly criticized CVC while Lotus isn't too healthy, but they have Maldonado, who, if he crashes less, is helping a lot on the budget.
But those teams are not safe at all.

The only teams that are financially stable right now is Ferrari, Red Bull, Mercedes (as long as Mercedes keeps underwriting the team, so they will need to keep winning), McLaren (with Honda's engines taking off quite much expenses), Williams (as long as they are able to keep they spending at the level they have now and still keep their competetive level) and Torro Rosso (that is if Red Bull still wants to pay for 2 teams, when it is cheaper to buy a seat for youngsters).
And realistically we have HAAS looking in. That's not healthy at all.

 

[Pamela USA]

I don't know why BMW don't jump in F1. They not have car of money to run F1 team? I believe they can run healthy team with money they have.

 

[Michael Watts]

With the current Prize money system in place I don't know how any up and coming team could hope to compete. The only teams making all the money are already well established and fully staffed. The Rich get Richer and the Poor.... well they get gone.

 

[Pamela USA]

With the current Prize money system in place I don't know how any up and coming team could hope to compete. The only teams making all the money are already well established and fully staffed. The Rich get Richer and the Poor.... well they get gone.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

I don't know why BMW don't jump in F1. They not have car of money to run F1 team? I believe they can run healthy team with money they have.

What do you get from being in F1 these days? The return for the hundreds of million USD you have to pour into a team to make it even remotely competetive...
In the old days, the coverage, the public opinion, the gladiator-factor and the wow-factor from being a class of "crazy" cars, that was almighty fast, dangerous to drive on the most challenging tracks was much larger that today, and at the same time, you could run a top team, for a budget that relatively speaking would put you around Force India today, and there was loads of sponsors that wanted to be in on F1, the glamour of sponsoring a team was so much bigger. Being in all kind of magazines, games, just dreaming, of one day being a part of a Villeneuve vs Arnoux, having the coverage of a Senna-esque Monaco-lap. Being able to keep the speed of the leading cars, with only 5th gear. Driving so hard that you faint when you finish. Pushing the man and machine to the limit. Developing the most amazing engine ever, or the most powerful quali-engine.

Today, you have a idiotic large budget, to develop a car with many spec parts, with limitation on almost everything, with artificial measures to overtake, while not punishing mistakes. Tyres that are made to work in a predefined way...

Compare with WEC. Toyota said they were spending around 50-70 mill USD to develop engine, car and race in the World Endurance Championship. Then look at their F1 figures, that was told to be around 450 mill USD, for a single season.
In WEC, Toyota used their first car in 2 seasons, then developed their new car, from that. And now they look like they'll win the championship as well.


Just as a pointer when it comes to budget. 70 mill USD, is around what HRT was reported to spend.
You can use that money on being hopeless far behind in F1, never using an actual new car, almost never try to develop the car, just trundle around at the back, not really doing much other than... drive.
Or you can win a World Championship, and fight for the Le Mans 2014 hrs glory for the same price. I'm pretty sure what would make the best PR these days.

 

[Michael Watts]

A top tier NASCAR team only will run you about 30 million per season. Pales in Comparison to F1 and their small field of Pay to Play Drivers.

 

[Pamela USA]

No worries <snip>

Mod edit - removed as it is off topic. This is a genuine motor sports F1 thread, not related to F1 2014 game skins

 

[Darth]

I don't know why BMW don't jump in F1. They not have car of money to run F1 team? I believe they can run healthy team with money they have.

I think that BMW is more willing to invest all that money into developing new thechnologies for their road cars instead of racing in F1. They are one of the few car companies in the world (maybe the only one) that spend so much money in search and development. It's not like BMW doesn't have the money to race, they are one of the profitable car businesses in the world!

 

[Philip Heck]

The return for the hundreds of million USD you have to pour into a team

To be honest it's not that expensive for the top tier teams. Working at Daimler I can assure you that MGP is getting very little money from the company itself and is mostly self sufficient through prize money and sponsors.

 

[Queequeg]

That's the crux, isn't it. If you are on top, winning races left and right, it does not cost you anything because sponsors will be willing to pay for your expenses on top of prize money. And you additionally get good PR for yourself for free.
If you are not on top, sponsors will give you not nearly enough to ever become competitive; that is if you are lucky enough to even have any without having to give Maldonardo a seat. Also the PR you get will not be worth anything because casual watchers don't care about backmarkers and your brand's reputation will not profit from it. On top of that, you only get very little prize money and therefore have to pay a medium eight or even nine digit sum per year for basically no return at all.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

To be honest it's not that expensive for the top tier teams. Working at Daimler I can assure you that MGP is getting very little money from the company itself and is mostly self sufficient through prize money and sponsors.

I see you write that. However this piece (where Merc co-operated fully to give information) Shows that Merc gave as much money to the team, as they got in prize money (60mill) and they got 75mill from sponsors.
And ended up with a 50mill loss!
Take away 30% of the funding that Merc provides and they would've lost 110 mill. Thats the budget for many teams.

HPP is High Performance Powetrains, and is the engine supplier, that supplies engines to all the Merc teams. The three stars is "Full co-operation/input".
The thing is, if I were to start a new team today, and get 60 mill from FOM and 60 mill from Daimler, I would be the 6th richest on the grid!
Heck, by getting the money from Daimler only, and nothing else, I would still outspend the lowest F1 teams.

Or like Audi said, to get into F1, they could run DTM, ALMS (USC) and WEC for several years, for the same money. It is just not financial viable when compared to what you get.

EDIT: Link and picture added

 

[Philip Heck]

I can only talk about the numbers that I have at my disposal