VW Enters.................

[FW17]

Audi has too much of an Infra and personal at their factory

Red Bull should sell to Red Bull tech to Renault and sell the team rights to Audi

[Manoah2u]

Audi has too much of an Infra and personal at their factory

Red Bull should sell to Red Bull tech to Renault and sell the team rights to Audi

Why would they, if RedBull goes hand-in-hand with Audi, they'll want all their RedBull tech in own team.

[FW17]

Audi has too much of an Infra and personal at their factory

Red Bull should sell to Red Bull tech to Renault and sell the team rights to Audi

Why would they, if RedBull goes hand-in-hand with Audi, they'll want all their RedBull tech in own team.

Meant that Audi would like to keep all their operations in Germany, Red Bull would sell the entry and all IP to Audi and the infrastructure and personal to Renault

[FoxHound]

Audi keeping operations in Germany will mean they'd have to have a completely new factory and wind tunnel.
Aside from the exorbitant cost, if we are looking at Audi coming aboard from 2017 the factory should have commenced construction.

Hasn't happened.

I expect it to be a rebranding of the current team, should the sale occur.

[Jonnycraig]

Audi keeping operations in Germany will mean they'd have to have a completely new factory and wind tunnel.
Aside from the exorbitant cost, if we are looking at Audi coming aboard from 2017 the factory should have commenced construction.

Hasn't happened.

I expect it to be a rebranding of the current team, should the sale occur.

More importantly, with their huge austerity drive just starting, they would need to abandon their highly successful WEC programme, with the highly company relevant diesel hybrids they championed, and a positive ROI, in order to plunge the thick end of a billion quid on and off track into infrastructure and a new powerplant, and still risk being beaten by their marketplace rival Merc.

Even rebranding RB would require an immense investment as they are not setup to build their own powerplant, let alone the hundreds of millions they take to develop.

Journos will happily keep this non-story going because on track there's nothing to discuss at the moment, but there's as much chance of it happening as there is of Grimsby winning the FA Cup

[FW17]

Audi keeping operations in Germany will mean they'd have to have a completely new factory and wind tunnel.
Aside from the exorbitant cost, if we are looking at Audi coming aboard from 2017 the factory should have commenced construction.

Hasn't happened.

I expect it to be a rebranding of the current team, should the sale occur.

More importantly, with their huge austerity drive just starting, they would need to abandon their highly successful WEC programme, with the highly company relevant diesel hybrids they championed, and a positive ROI, in order to plunge the thick end of a billion quid on and off track into infrastructure and a new powerplant, and still risk being beaten by their marketplace rival Merc.

Even rebranding RB would require an immense investment as they are not setup to build their own powerplant, let alone the hundreds of millions they take to develop.

Journos will happily keep this non-story going because on track there's nothing to discuss at the moment, but there's as much chance of it happening as there is of Grimsby winning the FA Cup

Money cannot move from one company to another, they may be one group but different companies. VW's problems are not Audi's or Porsche's

[noname]

Audi keeping operations in Germany will mean they'd have to have a completely new factory and wind tunnel.

-> Neuburg
http://www.autoblog.com/2014/09/04/audi ... -official/

[FW17]

Audi keeping operations in Germany will mean they'd have to have a completely new factory and wind tunnel.

-> Neuburg
http://www.autoblog.com/2014/09/04/audi ... -official/

Don't think that site has a wind tunnel in it. The R18 does its wind tunnel time at Sauber facility.

But Audi does have couple of full scale windtunnels at Ingolstadt


The attractiveness of Germany is that when Audi wants to quit it much less of a headache than in UK.
In the UK the team has to be sold or shutdown just costing too much in write-offs, In Germany the team can be just about redirected to another research project.

[FoxHound]

That is specific for dtm and sportscars.

And the windtunnels Audi use at Ingolstad are production car biased which do not fill F1 criteria.... as far as I'm aware.

[FW17]

That is specific for dtm and sportscars.

And the windtunnels Audi use at Ingolstad are production car biased which do not fill F1 criteria.... as far as I'm aware.

The infrastructure is already there, it just needs to be upgraded on the instrumentation and data collection side. Adding a rolling road will another task

[Jonnycraig]

Money cannot move from one company to another, they may be one group but different companies. VW's problems are not Audi's or Porsche's

You can't seriously believe that the group are going to plunge circa £1bn into developing a top F1 team whilst desperately trying to shed multi billions in another area, let alone all the aforementioned reasons why it would make no sense for Audi to drop WEC for F1.

[Glyn]

Money cannot move from one company to another, they may be one group but different companies. VW's problems are not Audi's or Porsche's

You can't seriously believe that the group are going to plunge circa £1bn into developing a top F1 team whilst desperately trying to shed multi billions in another area, let alone all the aforementioned reasons why it would make no sense for Audi to drop WEC for F1.

The only reason VW would join F1 is to truly cement themselves as being the greatest manufacturer in the world. They would need to continue their winning ways with WEC and then copy this over to F1.

Being the best at both of the pinnacle of motor-sports would really show their class. (But it's a massive gamble).

Plus the money they are already spending in WEC....isn't really costing them anything....if they are making a profit out of it as others have mentioned on here.

[FW17]

Money cannot move from one company to another, they may be one group but different companies. VW's problems are not Audi's or Porsche's

You can't seriously believe that the group are going to plunge circa £1bn into developing a top F1 team whilst desperately trying to shed multi billions in another area, let alone all the aforementioned reasons why it would make no sense for Audi to drop WEC for F1.

If that be the case how does VAG justify spending half a billion euros a year through Porsche and Audi for WEC

[FoxHound]

500 million euros is not the net spend. Gross yes, but they recoup alot in terms of advertising and brand exposure.

And 500 million euros is exposure for 2 brands.

F1 is a bigger expense and a different formula of which VW has no experience at all.
By setting up with Red Bull, VW mitigate the risk financially, and to whichever brand they decide to enter.

By going the whole hog and building their own operation, they expose themselves to a world of hurt.
It's far easier and cheaper to jump into bed with Red Bull.

[FW17]

Infiniti had a brand exposure of over a billion dollars in 2013, Merc had the same in 2014. SO brand exposure in WEC (probably less than a 100 million) and F1 is not compatible.

You get nothing in winnings in WEC, F1 would give you atleast 80 million if you beat force india

Audi budget for Le Mans has been over 250 million ever since they brought in the TDI engine (rest of the races were by Joest)