Your View: Who wins, who loses with Mercedes deal?
November 16, 2009 by SJ Skid
Filed under Prime & Option
It is a bit too early to say whether Mercedes’ purchase of Brawn GP will be the biggest story of an already momentous off-season for Formula 1.
But it sure is in the running, along with Toyota’s departure and Bridgestone’s pull-out following the 2010 season.
It also might be premature to determine just who the big winners and losers are going to be — but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.
For instance, my immediate thought when I saw the news that Mercedes had purchased control of Brawn GP was: “Well, now there will be enough money to keep Jenson Button.”
Not so fast.
Rumor throughout the day has been that Nico Rosberg and perhaps Nick Heidfeld will be the Mercedes GP drivers in 2010, leaving Button out in the cold — if by “cold” one can mean with the team perhaps most favored heading into next season: McLaren.
But that, of course, was before Mercedes essentially jumped ship from McLaren to Brawn, even if it will continue to supply Woking with engines for the next five years.
Perhaps Jenson to McLaren isn’t such a for-sure deal after all. And perhaps, as a result, Jenson is the big loser today.
Or is it Kimi Raikkonen, who I assume now is too expensive for the McLaren team to hire? Again, though — can you be a big loser when sitting out for a year means you make $17 million?
Seemingly the big winner is the Brawn GP team, which now has a secure financial future. But is that so clear? I can’t shake the fact that this team, which just had won both championships, could not find the backing of two or three title sponsors and remain a privateer under Ross Brawn.
Ross Brawn? Is he the big loser here? Mercedes says he’s making the decisions, but how much more will Norbert Haug be second-guessing Ross? And how will Ross, long-term, handle that?
What about McLaren, which — while it is spinning the news as a positive — just lost its long-standing partner? I scoffed during last week’s podcast when Todd referred to McLaren as a privateer. Now, they are. How will take team handle being, more or less, Williams F1?
Is Nico Rosberg the winner today, presuming he ends up as Mercedes’ No. 1 driver? Or… would he have been better off as the No. 2 at Mercedes McLaren?
And what of Lewis Hamilton? He seemed poised to thrive at a top-funded, top-performing team for the rest of his career. Is he going to be stuck with a middling team until he can get out of his contract?
Is Lewis Hamilton our big loser?
What says you, F1Bers? And what do you think the fall-out, ultimately, will be from today’s news?
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The big question here is whether the loss of Mercedes investment is going to mean a significant drop in budget for the McLaren team. Surely with the “resource restriction” coming into play the loss will be substantially mitigated; there is every possibility that the excellent facilities Mercedes have paid for over the last 15 or so years will stand McLaren in very good stead moving forwards.
Indeed, I find your assumption that a privateer team is ipso facto a “middling team” surprising. That has not historically been true. McLaren won drivers’ and constructors’ championships in 1998. The previous works team to be constructors’ champion was Ferrari in 1983, and the previous drivers’ champion from a works team was Ferrari’s Jody Scheckter in 1979. Williams, McLaren and Benetton, all “privateers”, won every one of the intervening championships.
Your view that works team equals success is borne out by the results from the last twelve seasons, but not historically. Indeed, Ferrari, McLaren and Renault are the only works teams ever to win the constructors’ championship. If we are leaving the era of the manufacturer, as many people suggest, McLaren may well be as well placed as any team on the grid despite the loss of Mercedes.
Surely Button is gonna be the loser unless he stays at Brawn – at McLaren, the car is built round Lewis’ style – who like Schu, seems to like it moving around under him – the complete opposite of Jenson’s style. Button to McLaren would kill his career I think…
Anthony… check back with us! Button to McLaren, unofficially!
…so, the question will become – can he live with Lewis!? Sure they’ll get along fine, but Lewis dusted Alonso when he was still quite inexperienced. Looking forward to the 2010 season already.
Brawn (as a team) is the biggest loser. They no longer exist.
I believe Mercedes have a lot more pull than they let on, seriously with a 75% stake in the team do they really expect us to believe that they will leave the decisions up to Ross? Even if he has the last say, his complete control has gone.
The silver lining for McLaren is that this is a good time to lose their partner. With the frozen engines, customer deals need not be a handicap (look at this year’s championship), and it does give McLaren scope to grow long term and maybe make their own motors.
I think the biggest winner here is Nico Rosberg, though. I’m tempted to put money down on the world championship now. (Though last year’s Brawn betters probably did much better!)
100% agree Mark re: frozen engines etc.
Also I might even join you and put $10 on Rosberg… Though I think Lewis will be holding the trophy high.
Of course I will have $10 on Webber too.
Very good point Mark. You should write for F1B…oh. I don’t see McLaren spousless for very long to be honest. Maybe Ron is the guy who could pull VW in as a supplier/partner?
I think we may be getting ahead of ourselves in assuming that McLaren will not be competitive without their Mercedes partnership. Mercedes still provides probably the best engine on the grid at the moment and McLaren still have that. Of course we even saw the privateer team Brawn take the title with a Mercedes engine this year, so McLaren will definitely still be in a strong position next season.
On the other hand, we have seen many works teams struggle at least for a few seasons before getting it right. Mercedes are definitely in a better position than Honda, Toyota, Jaguar (remember them?) etc were when they came back into the sport. But who knows, maybe the transition from Brawn to Mercedes won’t be so smooth. If Mercedes don’t get this right, they may end up like many of the other works teams before them and leave the sport disappointingly. They would end up being the big losers in all of this.
A few years down the line we may be asking why Mercedes ever chose to leave the long standing and successful partnership they had with McLaren, for a solo project during hard economic times, whilst so many other teams were falling around them.
The biggest loser? I’d say McLaren. Although you could never write the team off, you have to say it is still a big blow to lose their partnership with Mercedes.
The biggest winner? Think I’ll be different here and go for Kimi. The sequence of musical chairs (as well as his fussiness) may well leave him without a drive in F1 for 2010. This is probably not such a blow as he still gets 17million for sitting out, and gets a chance to spend more time on his little rallying hobby. If he decides he wants to return, he will come back with a point to prove. Prost and Lauda both returned from sabbaticals to claim another title. He will also have the benefit of knowing just how good Mercedes are and potentially securing a drive there.
The biggest unknown? Mercedes. Ross Brawn managed to work a miracle this year with his team, but lets not forget that he couldn’t get the job done before that with Honda. He now finds himself in a similar position again with Mercedes. Which way will it go?
Can’t wait for next season.
I’m getting so far ahead of myself I am already looking forward to the 2015 season.
The big winner will be Sebastian Vettel, 2010 World Champion!
There is no reason to think that McLaren will not be competitive in 2010. Their engine arrangement remains unchanged and I’m pretty sure their budget is also in place. Psychologically, there might be an affect, which could impact their performance.
The longer term view remains to be seen. They can still be competitive as Merc customers, or they might buy the BMW F1 engine program, or maybe hook up with another engine supplier.
The new Mercedes GP should also be good for ‘10. Brawn already began focusing on next season early in the ‘09 season and there is actually stability compared to last offseason.
I agree with AnthonyB, that if Button goes to McLaren, he will not have the machinery that fits his driving style. It could well be 2001 all over again for Jenson, and that will certainly cement his legacy as a champion only because of the car.
Brawn will be happy that Mercedes seem to have less of a controling hand than Honda had.
I think there is an elephant in the room … Honda sold the team to Ross + management for $1 AND paid for the year’s competition, Ross + management sell 75% of team to Mercedes for $???? a year later.
Benefits:
1. Management team bank profit
2. Management team retain 25% ownership
3. Ensures team’s future as other teams are dropping like flys
Drawbacks:
1. Has to get an S500 company car instead of his favorite old Honda civic
2. Will have to wear silver puffa jackets instead of bespoke Savile row tailored numbers (but we suspect he already digs the hip hop look right Todd?)
Colour me reactionary but I think we have a winner!
Spot on! I was just about to ask those same questions in this post!
O.K. I need a little help wrapping my head around this one. But didn’t Ross Brawn buy the team from Honda? And if so, then doesn’t that mean that a large chunk of the money Merc just bought into the team with go to Ross personally (making him the big winner)? And IF so, what does that say about Ross when he can’t find enough money to pay Jenson, who took a pay cut to save the team, then played a huge roll in bringing up the teams value to be attractive to Merc in the first place, so Ross could make that money?
According to James Allen on the ITV website
“By rough estimates, presuming that he held a majority stake in Brawn GP, he must have personally made around £30 million this year from taking on the team from Honda for £1 and then reselling it nine months later.”
So far the biggest loser is Jense; even if Jense gets more money at Macca, he will play second fiddle to the Hamiltons
I don’t think Macca is a loser here; he will get Mercedes engines, no interference on strategies and drivers management. Macca looks sounding economically so much that they are begining a Ferrari-esque approach with its sport cars, buying Mercedes stake and yet, having enough money to run the F1 division…..a blast!
The biggest winner here is Mercedes; he waited looking for a Macca takeover, they didn;t get it and then buy 75% of the current champion team along with Ross Brawn and Co. It sounds to me like a recipe for success. The only bad thing about it is the fact that Brawn GP ends its existence after only one year and now there is one less privateer on the grid next year
I dont think there is a loser at all in this situation.
If its true the Jense signed with Macca I don’t see how he;s gonna get “equal” treatment with Hamilton as the first driver. Do you?
Kimi will be one if he has to sit out this season. OK he gets paid but that is not what we want to see of him. I want to see him drive his way to another championship.
The winner is F1 in general. Its great to see a manufacturer actually investing in the sport whilst others are heading out the back door. Part of the attraction seems to be the financial limits the Brawn team managed operate under.
McLaren will still be force, you don’t become a poor team overnight and with the loss of Toyota, BMW and possibly Renault, its going to be a few teams out in front and I’d expect McLaren to be one of those.
Ideally Mercedes will look to obtain Vettel sometime in the future. He isn’t going to win a world championship with Red Bull. It’s only a matter of time before he arrives at the Mercedes team. Quite happy with Nico as the number one driver for next season; now he has the opportunity to show how good he really is.
Good points Raith. I second the Vettel thought as well. That seems like a possible objective for them. As a Brawn fan, are you slightly bummed to see the little team that could go away? I have had several emails from Brawn fans lamenting the loss of their intimacy and small-team spirit.
maybe Merc puts its eggs on Brawn basket after learning from Macca how to partner with a privateer and boost its image. Its up to Merc to leave to Brawn the lead and give him room to run the team, or Honda-like, mess it up. It looks very promising on paper; you may expect RBR, Merc GP, Macca and Ferrari(?) to challenge for the WC
Biggest winner? Ross Brawn:
He has just personally made tens of millions selling his interest in Brawn GP. Mercedes continue to invest in him, as he is allowed to continue in his role, doing what he does so brilliantly. Also, there is nothing in this deal which detracts from his professional or personal reputation; indeed, Mercedes’ faith in his accomplishments strengthens them.
Biggest loser? Jenson Button.
He’s about to lose a game of chicken with his employers; no championship-winning driver should be in this precarious position in the first place, and it says a lot about how his abilities are rated by those who know these things best. On top of that, being (likely) cast out by his former team is only ever going to reflect on him badly. And we all know the fate which befalls him if he moves to MacLaren.
So where is MacLaren in all this? I suspect they’re just fine.
It seems they’ve been preparing for this ‘parting of ways’ with Mercedes for a long, long time, and their version of events leading up to the Brawn buy-out comes across as b.s.-free. I mentioned in another post that I thought their development of a bespoke V-8 engine for their road car was petty ominous, and it all makes good sense now.
The only surprising thing for me is Mercedes’ apparent medium- to long-term commitment to F1. Other than that, the whole situation seems amicable, meticulously-planned, and good for F1.
Mercedes buy-in is a clear example that the global economic downturn is more like a mental state of distress and a clear example that during hard times is when you can make BIG decisions by buying cheap and getting profits out of the ones who made the investments in the first place.
I wonder how the black tie chaps at Honda feel after such a horrendous move to bow out of the F1 and give away all the infraestructure and people, years of investments and corporate image for the rush to show “some savings” philosophy to their customers and stockholders
Mercedes is the big winner:
McLaren have got to buy out the stake Merc has in their team for roughly the same amount of money the Germans´ are to invest in Brawn. So they´re actually trading a 40% stake in a private team for a 75% in another team, thus getting to decide everything in the former Brawn.
Brawn -the engineer- is a huge economic winner, and despite some fans arguing that the team is set to lose all the romantic flair of David vs Goliath that it had this year, they should be realistic: brawn won on an extremely risky gamble: the double diffuser. Without that, the team would only not have won anything but would have disappeared in the middle of an economical meltdown, and it´s very unlikely that they will have the opportunity to pull out another stunt like that, so they are good to look for Merc´s shelter where it is warm n´cozy.
Macca are likely losers but it looks like it can be a soft landing, so it really depends on them.
Ferrari could be losers, with another strong team in the starting grid.
Button IS a loser. He´s already got his millions and if he really was looking to make a statement, he wouldn´t trade money for position. Macca will be covering him in gold, but only as far as he knows which is his position in the team: that´s Hamilton´s sidekick. Some argue that this is bravery, that he´s ready to take on Ham in his home turf. I just think that at twentynine, he´s happy to swim in money knowing that the -unexpected- glory days are behind him now.