Team Lotus has confirmed that it is expanding its wind tunnel operations having confirmed a deal with Williams F1 to use one of the Grove based team’s two wind tunnels from September 2011. Team Lotus will now be running a two tunnel programme, with the Aerolab facility in Italy working in conjunction with the Williams F1 site in the UK while work continues on the team’s own wind tunnel at Hingham. When that facility is operational all activity will be transferred to the team’s own site.
“There are a number of reasons why I am delighted that we have signed this deal,” said Tony Fernandes. “From a practical perspective there are the obvious benefits of increasing our wind tunnel activity and using a state of the art facility in the UK, and I am sure that will immediately help Marianne Hinson (Head of Aerodynamics and CFD) and her team to work even more effectively in one of the key areas of the ongoing development of our team. The other side of the agreement is that I owe a great deal of thanks to Frank Williams, Patrick Head and Adam Parr as they were the first people I ever worked with in Formula 1. AirAsia was a proud sponsor of their team and Frank, Patrick and Adam played key roles in introducing me to the Formula 1 world, so I am very pleased that we are able to keep working together as Team Lotus continues to establish itself as a serious force in Formula 1.”
Wait a couple more hours and I expect an even bigger announcement from Team Lotus from New York.
Sponsorship from General Electric… and a big one at that.
Either that or sponsorship from the M&M shop…
Tony seems to be making all the right moves, very impressive plans and the “expected” sponsorship is very exciting!!
wishing them all the best!
Roger Penske was a nonexecutive director @GE and had sponsosorship from them, and also Ferrari was sponsored by GE in the past.
Any one want to bet against Steve Neilsen turning up at Lotus?
Tony,
Yes, I would take that bet.
GE? That will make a few team principals choke on their afternoon aperitif. I wonder how many years some have been working on trying to land GE?
Impressive this Tony chap.
Equally impressive is that Joe you seem to get them right all the time? How did you do that? Do you have private access to Tony himself or his secretary perhaps?
Chee,
You’ll never know.
Cynic,
Yes, sponsorship from the M&M shop, with a livery that looks like 1994 all over again, and Kyle Busch driving! What could possibly go wrong?
Another good move from Tony F. It’s actually quite exciting, this long, slow, grinding process of Tony slowly reeling Group Lotus in. Every so often a flash of water in the distance as Dany Bahar jumps above the surface, fighting desperately to shake the hook loose — but Tony is inexorable.
Can’t wait for the day when Tony drives a new Lotus Super Seven up the drive of Ketteringham Hall, flanked by a Team Lotus 127 on one side and Clive Chapman in a (not Classic) Team Lotus 49 on the other, with a new Evora behind…
G.E. Spot on as usual Joe.
I like TF’s style. He built up a team from scratch rather than buy an under-performing outfit and is now exploiting the synergies with all his other businesses and contacts. From his tweets I suspect he’s lining up Blackberry as an F1 sponsor.
Just needs to replace the driver (clue: power-steering) that’s not pulling his weight, put KERS on the car and Team Lotus will be battling with the established teams.
I like it, he seems to be very serious about his venture into F1. I hope they bring the Lotus name back to its rightful place in the grid.
When will they confirm that Trulli won’t be there for 2012?
Tom,
They won’t.
“Sponsorship from General Electric… and a big one at that.”
I do hope so.
Its broken on Speed tv Joe
Team Lotus confirms… GE!
http://www.teamlotus.co.uk/news/2011/ge-announcement
Congrats Joe, you got it right again!
Team lotus with proper financial backing could be awesome in 3-4 years time. I think it’s too much ti expect a race winning car before then but it would be great to see those bottle green lotus cars picking up podiums again (with whatever future star they can attract to a drive with big GE money backing).
Another great prediction from Joe. It’s amazing the size of companies and brands that Lotus is getting behind it, it shows the power of connections.
Interesting that the teamlotus.co.uk website has gone down. Perhaps a lot of extra traffic?!
Tony needs to give the Genii boys (why do I get the feeling Flabio has his hand in this pie?) a lesson in how to aquire sponsors with a back of grid team pulling GE, maybe Williams & Sauber too
Well that made my day. It was getting frustrating explaining to my non fan friends “but those aren’t the good guys!”* and then having to pause for 40 seconds . . . and point like a rabid Setter at the green cars. (if you get my idea, mid race, silence be enforced at starts to first pit
)
Nice front running Joe! Saw article, looked again, closed browser, crossed fingers, touched wood all that, and didn’t dare to look until now . . this one deserves much more coverage than the usual release pieces.
*very hard to do in Russian company, obviously i don’t mean badly about Vitaly and Nick.
So, Danny, where’s that appeal you were grumbling about?
Realistically, this must have been in the works for a long time, and no way would GE come in, if they thought there was going to be another slanging match. I should thank again Paul Tan, who i noticed in the comments a little ago, for digging up that first hearing transcript, which gave away many clues as to the tenor in Court.
Hopefully in the trash bin with all the other demeaning copy that fluttered about over TL/TF.
Anchor sponsor . . . then fill any bodywork gaps with a rosta. I still have aesthetic reseverations about branding color schemes, mind, but give me green to work with any day over black and gold . . .
best from me – j
Thought to add, as for CFD design input, this is bagging the elephant. Or the only elephant i’d give as much berth to as Rolls Royce, and RR is far more specialised, “narrower” though that is not a pejorative use of that word. Flaming superb deal. In time to start on next year’s car, too. Sweet!
Joe, great work as always. Any information on just how “big” this deal is? Figures? Interesting that they’re not title sponsor, does this mean someone else is in the wings for the title sponsor? What ever happened to the Sonangol deal……
lr38,
may i hazard a guess?
Not Red Bull money,
but neither discounted to any other Name sponsor deal, because the story, backed by a faster car, is simply too good.
(Lots of quite good guesses as to that kind of figure float about the internet.)
You may try to buy in the dips, in a market. But you don’t sell in the dips, and there is only one seller.
I’d even go so far as to say it’s been sold at a premium, and then there’s the “intangibles” which really are very tangible. This’ll be one of the better kept F1 secrets, the actual money, i think. They probably got a tax break for opening a design office in Mauritius also
– j