Mercedes - the eternal debating abyss.

[FoxHound]

Bhall I get it just fine thank you.

You are comparing apples with pears, and saying the orange juice aint good enough. Mercedes in F1 is business.
Their 40 million a year spend on the team(out their own pockets) is nothing, in comparison to what a global AMG marketing campaign would cost in a year.
This is irrefutable.

You can excuse Ferrari, because of their "financial rulebook"? Not a chance are you worming out of that. When you start bandying phrases like "immoral", to describe Mercedes AMG, but excuse Ferrari because of their "rulebook", tells me you have no understanding on this subject.
Double standards all the way eh, bhall?

[wunderkind]

And I will counter your anti-pathos by suggesting you are in dreamland comparing an F1 team and it's associated issues with that of of concern Daimler has ploughed 10's of BILLIONS into already.

Wow, you really don't get it, do you?

Pouring money into a Formula One team is not the path to better days for any company*. Formula One is a luxury. If it was an effective marketing tool, they wouldn't be losing money, "effective marketing" meaning what it means and all. Honda and Toyota understood this. That's why they packed up and left the sport when economic reality meant they could no longer afford the luxury of fielding a Formula One team. It's called responsibility.

So, while you stand on a soapbox to defend Mercedes GP as an institution that owes something to its ~500 employees, I'm going to stand on a taller soapbox and question Daimler's handling of their other ~275,000 employees.

Don't be mad. You brought it up, and I appreciate that, too. You've convinced me that Mercedes GP as a business venture is immoral.



* Don't bring up Ferrari. Their financial rulebook is written in a different language on a different planet.

Just to clarify a few things:

Daimler is a profitable company and can easily afford to be in F1.

You can't compare Mercedes-AMG F1 to Honda and Toyota. Honda was faced with the choice of firing a couple of thousand people or make $200m of cost cuts. They chosed to quit F1 and saved those jobs.

Toyota was also in financial trouble and threw the hat into the ring after spending an estimated $1.50billion since the inception of their F1 team. There were no realistic possibility of the team winning a race, let alone vying for the championships.

Mercedes-AMG at least has the ingredients in place to make a serious attempt at winning.

[FoxHound]

I'm guessing Bhall wants Daimler to plough even more Billions into EADS further risking these 275,000 employees, including AMG and the F1 concern.
End of the day, Daimler bailed out MTU, Dornier AEG way back in '89. 23 years since then there is a deficit in the money put in from the money brought out.
Aside from the fact that aero defence is linked to national security, the costs cannot all be absorbed by a single company, as they found out...and created EADS(via merger with other companies). The situation is still not remedied, so why blame the F1 team which has direct links to Daimler's CORE products in Mercedes, to a company that has had 23 years of being spoon fed by the company and no direct link to the CORE of Mercedes products or workforce?


The whole raison d'etre for the sale of EADS is to secure the jobs. It's a incredible someone would compare one arm of a company that costs 40 million, to another which has bled Billions, and that closure of the smaller entity would somehow magically remedy the EADS situation. And a side note here....Daimler are 12.5% shareholders.

It is laughable.

[bhall]

JET, I cautioned you against bringing up Ferrari for your own good. I don't want you to look foolish, because Daimler's rules simply do not apply to Ferrari. They exist in entirely different markets with entirely different market strategies. Their F1 teams also have entirely different contracts with FOM and sponsors, which means they have entirely different costs to their respective parent companies. But, hey, go there if you must.

And for what it's worth, you've completely missed the point about EADS. Run with whatever you like, though.

wonderkind, Mercedes wants to cut a little more than $200 million. Try €2 billion. It seems their forecast didn't quite pan out.

Whatever it takes to make sure Mercedes GP can continue to embarrass the Silver Arrows, right, fellas?

[FoxHound]

bhall

We aren't excusing the teams sub par performances. But I'll ask you this, was there a clambering for Red Bull to quit in year 4?
Year 4....of their project they had 1 podium and finished 7th. That's with Newey and a 300million plus budget.
That's a backwards step bigger than what we are seeing with Mercedes.
But where are Red bull now?

Mercedes are at least trying to make a fight of things. Had they just simply thrown cash around, as per Honda/Toyota etc. then there would be an even bigger hole right now.
You know they have hired and fired and upgraded the factory, and are going through metamorphosis phase right now. It applied to Red Bull, and it applies to Mercedes now.
So I can understand the flak, but I can't excuse people wishing termination on this project.

[Cocles]

What? You think the W03 is going to pick up a couple of tenths if people refer to its maker properly?

I believe we're now witnessing the death throes of a position that's been ill for quite some time. Mercedes GP must exist, because Mercedes GP employees have mouths to feed, and if people would just get the name right, this whole thing would turn around in a flash.

Word of the day: obfuscate

Not at all. I just find it awfully passive aggressive. You'll notice it's only the haters who use the old name.

[Cocles]

You've convinced me that Mercedes GP as a business venture is immoral.

[Cocles]

JET, I cautioned you against bringing up Ferrari for your own good. I don't want you to look foolish, because Daimler's rules simply do not apply to Ferrari. They exist in entirely different markets with entirely different market strategies.

You can only make that statement, because when it comes to Mercedes you make it all about Daimler, yet when it comes to Ferrari you behave as if Fiat doesn't exist. Are we talking about parent companies or not?

What was the definition of "obfuscate" again?

[bhall]

JET, I cautioned you against bringing up Ferrari for your own good. I don't want you to look foolish, because Daimler's rules simply do not apply to Ferrari. They exist in entirely different markets with entirely different market strategies.

You can only make that statement, because when it comes to Mercedes you make it all about Daimler, yet when it comes to Ferrari you behave as if Fiat doesn't exist. Are we talking about parent companies or not?

What was the definition of "obfuscate" again?

Go ahead, chief. What is it about Ferrari and FIAT that you'd like to discuss that has any bearing whatsoever on Mercedes GP? I'm here for you. (And will you generously accept my use of that moniker since I use it for expediency rather than the torturously long Mercedes AMG Petronas?)

EDIT:

[...]
But I'll ask you this, was there a clambering for Red Bull to quit in year 4?
Year 4....of their project they had 1 podium and finished 7th. That's with Newey and a 300million plus budget.
That's a backwards step bigger than what we are seeing with Mercedes.
But where are Red bull now?

[...]

Red Bull was born from the ashes of Jaguar. Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team (Happy, Cocles?) was delivered from the gilded womb of a World Champion. Are you sure you want make comparisons to Red Bull and then talk about progress?

[raymondu999]

[Deleted]

[bhall]

[Deleted]

[FoxHound]

Red Bull was born from the ashes of Jaguar. Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team (Happy, Cocles?) was delivered from the gilded womb of a World Champion. Are you sure you want make comparisons to Red Bull and then talk about progress?

Hmmmm let me think Bhall....

1.The most heavily invested car in F1 history, with a near 18 month gestation period, and circa 300-400 million ploughed into it. Honda/Brawn ditched 2008 entirely to focus on the 2009 rule change.
This car had more time, and more money thrown at it than any other.

2.The outwash front wing was pioneering, and a result of point 1.

3. The double diffuser. We know all about this, and the loopholes the team found in the 09 rule set.

It was a perfect storm scenario, and of course a major rule change to throw into the mix(.4).

Then you have what happened AFTER Honda pulled the plug.
1.40% of the staff made redundant
2. Suppliers and partners lost to other teams.
3.2009 budget stripped to barebones, meaning any 2010 car development was restricited and the knock on effect it would have on the rest of the lineage.

Now you are going to sit there and tell me Mercedes inherited a McLaren like team?
Red Bull took over from Jaguar/Stewart who themselves had a comparable record to the BAR/Honda team. The 2009 flash in the pan means nothing other than they got lucky with new rules and it took others time to catch up and implement the DDD and outwash front wing.
I think you expected Brawn GP to match Red Bull's upgrade success rate in 2009 with half the staff missing and a skeleton crew budget....

[FoxHound]

What is it about Ferrari and FIAT that you'd like to discuss that has any bearing whatsoever on Mercedes GP? I'm here for you.

Quite simple. You put Daimler's participation in F1 via Mercedes AMG as immoral, due to the expense and the implications it had on their 260,000 staff.
(Whiteblue published some interesting stats....the actual spend for Daimler on the team is £10.1 million before taxes....).

If you are going to throw this at the team, you cannot do this in isolation. Every team should be judged accordingly for balanced debate and judgement.

FIAT via Ferrari are deep in the mire, and their saving grace is selling off assets and shares, Government assistance, along with a chrysler merger.
Now, what of the 140,000 staff that work for them?

Daimler turned 6 billion in profit for the year end 2011. £10.1 million is not going to make a blind bit of difference, and to suggest it will is extremely short sighted and ill-informed.

[bhall]

JET, JET, JET.

First off, I'm happy to see that you've come to understand the Brackley-based F1 team. And you're absolutely right; they've never done anything absent extenuating circumstances. It's beyond me why anyone thinks their hiring of other teams' castoffs is going to turn around 30+ years of abject futility. Red Bull's success required the hire of the greatest designer the sport has ever seen, circumvention of testing rules via the purchase of another team, and quite simply shitting all over the RRA through the use of Red Bull Technology as a sort of "aerodynamics supplier."

But, hey, hope springs eternal.

(See what I did there?)

Second, if you insist on bringing Ferrari and Fiat into this discussion, let me remind you that Ferrari is profitable (€2 billion give or take, or roughly the same amount Mercedes wants to cut from its books); it has a massive contract with Philip Morris, not to mention a $40 million/year deal with Santander; it makes more money from F1 than any other team (something like $100 million/year, I'm not sure); and the Scuderia costs exactly $0 to its parent, Fiat. I fail to see how any of that has any bearing on a discussion about Mercedes GP, though. But, you wanted to talk about it. So, there you have it.

(And c'mon, what did WhiteBlue really say when you asked him if it was fair to assume that Daimler's spend on MGP was roughly $10 million?)

Lastly, my remark about Mercedes GP being an immoral business venture wasn't meant to be taken seriously. I considered it a silly parallel to your absurd assertion that the team has a debt of responsibility to its 500 employees. Providing paychecks has never been a reason for the existence of a Formula One team.

However, I'll admit that my comment was too dry. So, I get why you and Cocles took it seriously. That was my fault.

Are we done yet?

[wunderkind]

Bhallg2k,

Just a minor correction. In 2011, Ferrari made revenues of €2.251billion. Net profit was only €209.1m.

Daimler's 2011 net profit was a little over €6.00billion.