Honda F1 in trouble, and withdraw from F1

[donskar]

I would suspect that Carlos Ghosn will be looking at the Renault F1 bottom line VERY carefully.

And if Honda goes, why should Toyota stay?

Bad, very bad.

[meves]

Hopefully they will be better but it has to be a worry. If Toyota stop supporting them which I'm sure they are for running Kazuki Nakajima then they could be in trouble. But they have title sponsorship which Honda never got which is why they started the ridiculous Earth Car as a marketing ploy. Frank is also quite an astute business man which I don't feel that Honda have (I've never been convinced by Nick Frys business accumin) currently in their F1 team although at least they have the techinical brain now of Ross.

Renault is a worry as they have always been quite cost sensitive and have been looking at the cost/benefit of F1 for a while. I hope that Toyota can weather the storm a little more easily than Honda as Toyota have revenues of $300 billion to Hondas $120 billion.

[tarzoon]

Yup, what about Jenson ? Rubens is old enough to retire but JB will need to find a competitive drive. He may still be paying Frank back when he jumped ship some years ago.

what about the 800 workers?

[JiMbO]

maybe this opens up a space for porsche????

[JiMbO]

maybe this opens up a space for porsche????

[Carbon]

Is a mass exodus coming to F1? In light of the dismal economy, and the slow down in global auto sales, Honda may be the first to jump from the racing ship. I suspect all manufacturers are looking hard and long at their bottom line, witness Audi scrapping their very successful LMS program http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/72314. To whit, the Le Mans test session was also cancelled based on cost savings.

Year over year sales figures (Nov. 07 to Nov. 08) gleened from outside sources include:
Audi -25.4%
Acura -38.9% (Hello, ALMS?)
Chev -36.9%
Mercedes -38.2%
Porsche -48.2%
BMW -26.8%
Honda -31.6%
Toyota -33.9% (makes you wonder about commitment)

In fact, the only marque that showed positive growth was Mini, up from November 07 by a whopping 43%. I couldn't find any sales figures for our friends from Marenello, but they're likely not overly rosey.

Given the change in rules and regulations in 2009, and potentially again in 2010 (read: investment/expensives/$$$), we're bound to see a few more Teams exit stage right, bringing the already small grid down by several notches.

[Carlos]

F1 could look over it's shoulder and take a look at that other cash cow series - NASCAR.The US domestics started talking to Brian France about 5 months ago about trimming back involvement and he just went on and on about what a great show they have, a proven product, a massive fan base ... and blahblahblah ... sounded a lot like Bernie and F1 as spectacle. Now that the CEO's of Detroit have come around and owed up to the fact ther's a bit of trouble on the doorstep, they cut racing sponsorship back a bit ... no more 3 car teams, no more 50 man pit crews. Then ABC drops a NASCAR race a few laps from the finish and France starts to wakey wakey. From what I've heard - NASCAR is on a diet. Thursday testing is gone, Friday qualifying is gone, it's just Saturday and racing on Sunday. They might even cut out Saturday, triming back the number of races. It's definitely getting ugly. F1 can expect a few changes.

"NASCAR chairman Brian France is unhappy with ABC's decision to bump the final laps of last weekend's race in Phoenix to a cable station in favor of "America's Funniest Home Videos."
The Seattle Times Nov 11, 2008

[djos]

It's stuff like this that makes the FIA's 250 max personell idea look like a really good idea.

I'd also like to see a ban on Car makers owning more than 25% of F1 Teams and being limited to supplying power-trains to teams.

I'd also like to see "cheap*" 1.5 ltr v6's with twin turbos that have to last an entire race weekend including friday practice.


*minimum weight and CG to prevent materials like unobtainium or unaffordium being used extensivley.

[pipex]

Oh my god! This is crap
They didn't sacked Nick Fry when it was the right time...

[Ian P.]

Seems that some folks forget that F1 is a business. It costs money to be in the game but the tangable (and very tangable) benefit is advertising. Honda chose to pour as much money into F1 as they did on the expectation of a benefit. Williams does the same and while they may not be profitable every year, a private and successful team doesn't hang around for as long as they have by running a bad business. Kudos to Frank.
F1 is about money. Pure and simple. If someone or a manufacturer chooses to spend spend spend in spite of good sense, sorry, whatever benefit you get from it is going to be reduced accordingly.
Max may talk about cutting costs but he just doesn't get it. Honda is a classic example of an organization trying to buy success at any cost. KERs, new aero, changing tyres and in the past years changing engines have dumped enermous development costs on the teams. Max is trying to limit the areas where teams can do development but they just spend the same (or more) because now things are different and they need to work more and harder to try to get ahead. My bet is that Max has hardly reduced costs at all over the last 5 years with all the changes he has imposed.
I hate to see Honda go as much as anyone. I just wish they had been a little more frugal and wiser. I can't see anyone buying the team but there is hope.

[TRICKLE69]

Is a mass exodus coming to F1? In light of the dismal economy, and the slow down in global auto sales, Honda may be the first to jump from the racing ship. I suspect all manufacturers are looking hard and long at their bottom line, witness Audi scrapping their very successful LMS program http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/72314. To whit, the Le Mans test session was also cancelled based on cost savings.

Year over year sales figures (Nov. 07 to Nov. 08) gleened from outside sources include:
Audi -25.4%
Acura -38.9% (Hello, ALMS?)
Chev -36.9%
Mercedes -38.2%
Porsche -48.2%
BMW -26.8%
Honda -31.6%
Toyota -33.9% (makes you wonder about commitment)

In fact, the only marque that showed positive growth was Mini, up from November 07 by a whopping 43%. I couldn't find any sales figures for our friends from Marenello, but they're likely not overly rosey.

Given the change in rules and regulations in 2009, and potentially again in 2010 (read: investment/expensives/$$$), we're bound to see a few more Teams exit stage right, bringing the already small grid down by several notches.

I do not see nissan/renault on that list??

BMW ownes MINI.

[vs331]

Next in line could be Force India. Already Vijay Mallya is clamoring for a bailout from the Indian government for his airline business. I feel even he might consider F1 as one indulgence he can ill afford, however steady the income from his booze buisness might be.

Given how worse things are getting, only A1 GP type series can survive. They are a lot cheaper and have the added nationalistic flavor.

[timbo]

There's difference between how Honda runs a team and any other team. Honda is the ONLY team without title sponsor (well, maybe RBR and TR may be viewed as not having title sponsor as it owns them) and yet they spend as much or more than everyone else. This was very strange situation so I think other teams may be a bit better.
As for cost-cutting in F1 and independent teams with only business being is racing I'm all for it. But not by the measures Max propose.
Budget ban + ideas that Carbon named sound much more attractive.

[modbaraban]

Well, it's happening...

10 bottles of beer on the wall
10 bottles of beer!
take one down, and pass it around
9 bottles of beer on the wall!...

Why would a strugling manufacturer stay in a very expensive racing siries with uncertain prospects (that is of the team and of the series itself). And it's just before the inruduction of the rule changes that would possibly bring better economy by spending billions to meet those regs.

F1 is being pushed to the level where the teams wouldn't be in position to even discuss BE's proposals.

[WhiteBlue]

If you cast your mind back 13 years you will remember an F1 with very different structure. Mercedes Benz had not yet bought into McLaren and there was not a single manufacturer who owned his own team. Then Merc decided to abandon Sauber and switch to McLaren. They started to spend money in unprescedented amounts. This move was soon imitated by Honda, Renault, Toyota and BMW while Ferrari who had been without success for a long time rapidly improved their competitiveness and finances by employing the dream team.

Until 1995 the team budgets were mainly the money they got from FOM but now up to 70% of the budget was contributed by the automotives and this money was focussed on a few teams. Within 5 years money became the overwhelming factor for success. Even popular and rising teams with undoubted talent in management and engineering like Jordan had no chance when Honda decided to support the ridiculous BAR outfit instead of a proven winner. Jordan lost the works engine and soon found himself outspend by teams with less talent but better affiliations with the auto industry.

In my view the main fault of F1 was the lack of decisive action from the constructors when this became obvious seven or eight years ago. The only sensible step at that time would have been a cap on prices for customer engines and a duty to supply. The FiA tried that concept for a long time and failed due to lack of support from the GPMA teams.

I believe that F1 will only come out of the crisis they have been living in for eight years if they find a way to funnel the excess cash of the automotives towards investment or spending ways that do not generate a primary competitive advantage. There should be an incentive for the automotives to tie up that money in improving efficiency of the drive train of F1 cars. But the competitive advantage should be largely negated by supply duty at manufactureing cost. Continuing the policy of longevity of drive trains is the complimentary aspect that will support that strategy. This would create a self regulating mechanism that would keep manufacturers in F1 for the right reasons and put some of the cards back into the hands of private teams.

Honda and other companies in trouble may not be saved but they could have saved Super Aguri,which was the better team anyway as Jordan would have been better than BAR.