There has been much talk in Sao Paulo about Team Lotus in 2011. There is a law suit pending in the High Court in London to decide who owns the rights to the team name in Formula 1, but multiple reliable sources are reporting that a decision on the matter has already been made in Malaysia and that Lotus Racing will not become Team Lotus in 2011. Instead Renault F1 is going to be transformed into Team Lotus, with Group Lotus buying into the Enstone team. It remains to be seen whether the shares acquired will be from Gerard Lopez and his partners at GenII, or whether they will be the 25% of the team that is still owned by Renault. This will mean that Tony Fernandes’s Lotus Racing will have to find a new identity, which is a sad state of affairs given what has been achieved this season, but from what we are hearing the Air Asia boss and his partners are pushing ahead and will find a new brand to use. This helps to explain the strange press release announcing the deal between Renault and 1Malaysia Team (aka Lotus Racing) which was issued on Friday morning. We hear that Renault F1 has already asked for a name change for the future, but we have yet to get confirmation of this.
The politicians in Kuala Lumpur have decreed that Dany Bahar’s plans for Group Lotus are the right path for the future and in the fullness of time they will have be judged on whether that was the right thing to do. Bahar’s plans to revive the Lotus car company seem rather too good to be true, but one cannot fault the ambition. At the moment there is money behind the project and one hopes that there is enough to pay for all of Bahar’s many schemes. It is tough decision for Fernandes, who has done all the leg work for Lotus and is now having all of that work taken away. At the end of the day, however, he still has a very solid racing team, with good people and lots of ambition. It will be interesting to see what this becomes in the future, but it is fair to say that when Fernandes is involved in a project, there are always going to be surprises…
joeblogsf1 
Love the Eminem reference, given that he’s playing tonight.
good to see a great old name coming back with proper funding and support!
simon,
It already had proper funding and support. I doubt that the new funding will last forever… and what happens when all the investment cash runs out? Proton sure as hell are not going to pay for it?
What the bleeping beep?!? So just as Jordan became Spyker, once, Renault F1 will become Team Lotus next year? And the current Team Lotus will be something else? Is that… allowable? What if Virgin Racing wants to be called Ferrari, is that okay too?
If people were complaining about Tony Fernandes “desecrating” the Lotus name, I can’t see how this isn’t a lot worse…
bugger 😦
Language!
Hmmmm, the wrong Team Lotus me thinks….
The business model for Lotus road cars seems very ambitious, and as we have seen in the past 3 or 4 years, if the manufacturer ain’t selling cars, you ain’t racing in F1!
This is terrible news , as when Lotus cars don’t get what they expect on the retail sales side I guess they will lose interest in this , sounds a tie up aka Branson re Virgin !
Was fully behind the T F team and they were so sure of rights to Team Lotus , but if T F is willing to give up those rights for commercial reasons then I guess we need to think again .
Next weekend I am at the annual Michael Oliver film festival at Witney , theme is Lotus , Rindt , 50 years since Lotus first win etc , will be interesting what the panel of speakers who are lotus bods from the past have to say .
🙂
any idea what the chapman family make of all this?
Mr C,
I suspect the family will be discreet…
Given that ‘Lotus’ had to work so hard to convince the fans they were worthy of the name this year, and have genarlly succeded, This does seem very odd.
Danny Bahr looks set to have a lotus F1 team very few people will respect as genuine, which could end up undermining the car business.
It looks like a huge mess, i cant see anyone really gaining out of it, and when that happens you have to wonder whats really going on…
This is rather sad. With Fernandes and Gascoyne I really felt they care about the legacy of lotus in f1 and Colin chapman. I’m not sure dany bahar will care at all! Oh well, at least the team will still push on and progress!
Cross-threaded team names is going to take a fair bit of getting used to…
Can we please see Lotus called “Gascoyne” next year? I think he’s had so much influence over the squad and helped it along so much that he deserves to get to name it after himself. There’s probably some good sponsor-related reason why it won’t happen, but I can dream…
ok, so what about drivers? I guess Kubica stays at whatever-it-is-called Enstone team, but would they need Petrov’s money? There have been some rumours about Senna going to Lotus, but then I’m not sure which Lotus should that be, not mentioning Senna looks weak compared to Klien.
The real Team Lotus can’t stand up, it died a long time ago. While Fernandes may (or may not) be the lesser of two evils, neither of these marketing “brands” is the real Team Lotus and they never will be. Let’s see, what are Fernandes’s options for 2011? How about Team BRM? Team Vanwall? Maybe he can write Dan a big enough check to be the new Gurney Eagle? Oh, hell, maybe VW/Audi will let him use the Bugatti brand until they form the “Volkswagen – Powered by Audi” team in 2013 with their new 1.3 litre quad-turbo-diesel engines. As much as I hate Ferrari you have to give them credit for being the real thing, and having never waivered from their commitment to racing. God bless their tortured cheating little souls.
I think this is absolutely appalling.
@joe
Thanks for the reply
You know a lot more than me, and a lot more than anyone i know
However in my opinion the lotus group brand is strong, the success of Proton, and the Lotus Elise and subsequent use of the technology in other cars (tesla, Exige, Vauxhall ..etc) has put a lot of cash in the kitty. Now it looks like they have a bunch of new model’s they intend to release. Plus they have the backing of the King of Malaysia. All this looks to me like a company that’s risen from its troubles in the 90’s, has cash, and wants to be the next Ferrari, i doubt they will let this fail. No, let me correct that, I hope they don’t let this fail.
Plus they got Robert Kubica, who in my humble opinion is one of the best drivers out there right now. This is a big thing to say as i’m a huge Webber fan 🙂
Maybe I’m too much of an optimist, but i would really like to see the Lotus name up there with the big boys.
This is almost as bad as certain rumors about MW flitting about, whether they’re intra team hints or not.
But you only have to think what Malaysia can do to it’s most prominent politicians, to realize if there’s a bigger game, they’ll play it.
Musical chairs all over. FISA FOCA replayed with an Asian bent? (*) Fernandes on a string at a new shop?
Whatsisname from the UAE local lot was rating something . .
*many many expletives deleted*
– j
(* MY is largely Chinese and officially Muslim, think about the connexions. I know they’re good, very good across Arab nations. All they need is a few teams. Loutus version Heist, Lotus version Payoff, Williams . . . Mubadala, Where’s Ojjeh on this?)
Fernandes can just rebrand his team by taking another great name from the past, like Brabham, Tyrrell or Cooper Climax
simples
I meant *ranting* not rating.
If Qatar says they’re out to buy major western cultural outlets, bet you they discussed that widely amongst their neighbors.
Not like these parts of the world haven’t had one heck of a PR problem lately. Maybe this is the way.
Next up, Morocco with phosphate, see Business Week.
I’m highly sceptical about this although it makes sense for Lotus Cars to be related to the F1 team. I don’t know anyone in the motoring world who sees Behar’s plans for lotus as in viable, so we’d have to say Fernandes is the guy more likely to keep funding a very expensive F1 team.
I guess we’ll see how it transpires, and it’s a pity for Fernandes who seems like a sound guy and went about it with a lot of passion and dedication. Dani Behar on the other hand seems to be a bit of a….. naughty word Joe wouldn’t like.
So hot on the heels of the 2010 “Lotus” F1 team who have bent over backwards to build up public goodwill and show they “deserved” to use the brand name we have the 2011 “Lotus” F1 team who before they even announce the existance of the project are doing everything they can to make sure they never have any.
Lotus vs Lotus; Im looking forward to it already. With (the team formerly known as) Renault slipping further back due to their 50p budget and (the team formerly known as) Lotus moving forward with new bits from Renault (…) and Red Bull there might just be an on track race between the two at some point next season.
I’m really disappointed by this considering Fernandes appeared to have the legal high ground and had put all the work into reviving the brand. I think this team will be upper midfield next year so there must be a lot of interested brands out there. I’d invest in them…
I guess we’ll be seeing a lot more of your vieux muckaire Gino Rosato then… The good news doesn’t stop coming…
Ash,
Who knows?
Excellent!!!
Isn’t the Goverment of Malaysia a significant backer of Lotus Racing? What would be the incentive for them to continue supporting LR when Proton would promote the county through this new venture? Is Tony enough of a racer to see it through? What we do know is that he is a successful businessman – might he just decide to choose his battles and move on to something else?
If this comes to pass, how disappointing it will be. Surely however much investment GL currently have, it will all be absorbed and more bringing all the Paris show cars to market, at sufficient quaility levels for their prices, and funding all the other announced motorsport (but so far largely unfulfilled) activity. Passing up the opportunity of an essentially free F1 team seems like madness, especially one that has taken on the Lotus name and heritage with gusto. Toleman/Benetton/Renault have been successful in the past but that is their own heritage not Lotus’s. GL/Proton have treated Tony F and his team very shoddily.
Well that is just bizarre. How can Group Lotus decide that they are going to call themselves Team Lotus if Lotus Racing have the rights to the name? Whilst I understand that a certain degree of diplomacy might be required in the world of Malaysian politics, I think Tony Fernandes would be perfectly within his rights to tell Group Lotus to get knotted. He seems to hold all the cards, he has a new team who have just signed deals for Red Bull transmissions and Renault engines and seem to be on the up, while Bahar is an unproven quantity who appears, with the best will in the world, to be completely full of it.
I’m thinking of starting my own team and calling it Team Lotus now. I have no track record in Formula 1 and no rights to the name at all, but that does not seem to be any barrier…
How about ‘Tyrrell’? I’m sure Mike Gascoyne would go for that, and it would be a wonderful tribute to Harvey and Ken…
I feel for Tony Fernandes; as you say, he has done all the leg work in (re) establishing the brand in the racing world and now they have to begin again. This precedent will establish some strange practices and I would be interested to see how it can/will affect multi-year sponsorship contracts. I would think that some of the decisions to ‘invest’ in the company’s activities were based on affiliation with Lotus and if that is no longer the case, does this materially impact on the contract. Any thoughts?
Thanks, as always…
They could always call it Tyrrell, I’m sure Mike Gascoyne would like that..who owns that name nowasays?
It’s a disappointing really. I can’t help but think the real problem is too many egos butting heads. From a fan’s perspective the Fernandez / Gascoyne setup seems to have potential. If I was Proton I’d be putting my money into that.
Here’s another thought.
When Lotus Racing joined the championship at the start of this season, the FIA treated them as if they were a continuation of Team Lotus, with whatever entitlements go with it. I am not sure what they are, to be honest, but I remember a big deal being made about this at the start of the season, so I can only imagine that this arrangement must have been lucrative in some way.
What will now happen to these entitlements if Renault become Team Lotus and Lotus Racing are forced to change their name to something else? Will the FIA strip Lotus Racing of them and award them to the new Team Lotus? That hardly seems fair, since Lotus Racing will still be the same entity, only with a different name. And what will then happen to the similar perks that are due to the Renault name, which after all has a fairly extensive history of its own, dating back a number of decades? Surely the new Team Lotus could not expect those goodies along with those enjoyed by Lotus Racing this season?
Or will we end up with a team called 1Malaysia masquerading as Team Lotus, while the team actually called Team Lotus pretends to be Renault? Such a scenario seems no less ridiculous than the alternatives.
I think that the only thing we can be certain of is that given the fractured nature of the arrangement, ‘1Malaysia’ could be the very least accurate name Fernandes could have chosen.
Why not call Renault ‘Proton’ and be done with it?
I love it! After your earlier hatchet job on Bahar and Group Lotus, this is GREAT.
Neener neener neener!!! :-b 😆
jim,
If you love them so much, go buy a $125,000 Lotus…
This is a mess and ultimately devalues the Lotus “brand” (as they so like to refer to) as it is banded about, switched and swopped like an old t-shirt. I wish they’d keep Fernandes in change of Team Lotus and reconcile their differences. Real shame this. They both lose out. No wonder Bernie thinks they are all a shambles.
This also explains the title of your Renault story earlier I think!? 🙂
I think it’s sad that Dany Bahar etc. can take credit for the efforts Fernandes’ team this year. I think he’s done a wonderful job and I reckon the average F1 fan won’t know the difference between the two.
don’t understand this ; how can the malaysian government decide who owns the intellectual rights to the team lotus name ; I thought it was claimed james hunt’s brother who bought the team
Colin G,
The legal question does not matter if the government decides against you. The question now is whether the government will end up with egg all over its face…
You know… as a motorsport fan, I’ve learned to respect the will and the ambition of this man, Tony Fernandes. During this year, I enjoyed to see the growth of his project and I say that he was genuine to do this job of reviving Lotus Racing. Evrybody agrees that this decision is political, after what I see, here and in other places.
Let’s see what will hapens next. But here’s somethin undiniable: twelve months ago, nobody was talking of Lotus as a real team, and now…
I can’t say I agree with the way Group Lotus are going about this. I really feel sorry for Fernandes and co, doing all the legwork, only to be elbowed out the way once he’s managed to show that the Lotus brand isn’t dead in F1.
I get the impression that the he got the go ahead to announce the Renault deal with Lotus Racing on the condition that his team won’t be called Lotus next year.
But I’m just wondering, if Renault F1 is bought by Group Lotus, will they be able to re-brand the engines as Lotus engines? Thus allowing Fernandes’s team to be called Fernandes-Lotus or Air Aisia-Lotus or something along those lines.
Easy. Call it Brabham.
Then Mark can take Daniel Ricciardo along with him and there’ll be shrimp satays on the barbie for everyone.
F1 would then have two Brits in Mclaren, two Germans in Mercs, and two aussies in a machine cobbled together with bit from all over Europe. Then the BBC can really ramp up the WWII references.
Love the title of this post, hate it’s content. Fernandes really has done a great job with the Lotus brand, I was looking forward to seeing the name Team Lotus with Renault engines back on the grid. They’ve built quite a fan following in a very short time, I don’t think the fans will transfer quite as easily as the name.
It can’t be good for the team’s morale. They’ll most probably be called AirAsia now? What a waste.
This whole Renault becoming Lotus thing is going to confuse everyone!
Joe
Latched onto this site following your Oct 27th Renault/GenII/Lotus blog. Superb work you know, magic ball stuff.
I’ve now got you bookmarked for future Lotus/F1 news.
For the record, any team with Group Lotus backing is the one for me, it’s as close a connection were going to get to the real Lotus.
I agree with you about the money pot. An awfull lot is happening at the moment and at a very fast rate.
I just hope that egg isn’t left on face.
Keep up the good work!
Huh?
What happened to the Team Lotus entity that Tony purchased from David Hunt? Did that just go up in smoke, or has Group Lotus purchased the rights to the Team Lotus name back from Tony?
Confused…
Tom
That’s a real shame … wasn’t convinced by Lotus at the start of the season but they’ve really won me over since then and I don’t like the idea of other ‘Lotus’ trying to steal their glory. Would they be doing that if they had under achieved like HRT?
Awful, just awful.
Apparently having a bad reputation right off the bat does not even remotely concern Renault and Proton.
So how long will they be desecrating Colin Chapman’s legacy then? 3, maybe 4 years before they pull the plug?
Joe, any chance that [if there is a name change] Tony F. could/would try to get the “Brabham” name?
Brawley,
Don’t see that.
Dam, was really warming to Team Lotus. Hope Fernandes still has the stomach, deep pockets and backers to continue. Unfortunately politics seem to have won the day.
Lotus following in the footsteps of Ferrari? McLaren arn’t their yet and there are a few brains and deep pockets around that organisation.
As much as this boggles the mind imagine the confusion a breakaway series would have caused. Ah, the tapestry that is F1. Joe, you are indispensable.
You know – this is all assuming that the FIA and Bernie agree to the name change, which is something they’re extremely reluctant to do – Sauber are STILL officially called the “BMW Sauber F1 Team”…
If they are that begrudging in that clear-cut case, surely they force these two teams to continue under their current names?
You know – this is all assuming that the FIA and Bernie agree to the name change, which is something they’re extremely reluctant to do – Sauber are STILL officially called the “BMW Sauber F1 Team”…
If they are that begrudging in that clear-cut case, surely they will force these two teams to continue under their current names?
Ah well. What’s done is done I suppose — and you can’t fight city hall, or the Malaysian Ministry of Potentially Making Things Difficult for Airline Entrepreneurs either.
I just hope that when the Proton investors realise that their money has been swilled away and the team is sold or folded, Tony and Mike are there to snap up the Lotus name again and restore it to where it belongs.
The boys at sniffpetrol.com had a few very amusing bits on Group Lotus’s escapades around the time of the Paris Auto Show. Worth a look.
Dear all
Seems a tad unfair, but, hey, if it’s a choice of “Lotus” and a Cosworth versus “Add label here” and Renualt power with Red Bull transmission, it’s a no brainer.
What I’m more curious about is whether (the team currrently known as) Renault will have sufficient ah injection of cash to (a) get another 30bhp out of their engine, and (b) provide Robert Kubica with a vehicle which will be up there with McLaren, Red Bull, Ferrari, so that we may finally see the breadth and depth of his talent.
Another thought- will this morph into something like another Red Bull/Toro Rosso setup????
Cheers
MarkR
Fernandes tweets actively about his team and his other businesses. In case some of you haven’t noticed, here’s his comment concerning the Lotus name:
“Much said about our name. To many people reading to much into it. We are lotus racing this season. Next season we are still lotus.”
http://twitter.com/tonyfernandes
Personally, I am not too sure why should the M’sian backed team has so much of interested in the old British Team names.
The Lotus Group needed the “Name” to promote the car. That i understand, but why Fernandes need the name, just to full fill his childhood’s dream?
It is spirit of the racing that you need, just bought the “Name” basically mean nothing to most of the people, especially for the M’sian. Most of the M’sian won’t even know “Lotus”, what more about “Brabham” or “Tyrrell”. So, i cann’t see that naming after an old British Team will rise more fund from South-East Asia region.
Proton is the national car manufacturer of M’sia but It is never the first choice of M’sian, due to the poor reliability, and the design, guess only the designer themselves appreciate that.
As M’sian, we all hope that Proton and Lotus doing well, not because it is our national car manufacturer, because we are the one paying the bills when they screw up.
if u follow Tony on twitter,what about his comment:
Makes sense for racing team and group to be reunited. How and weather it will and in what form will form discussions over next few months.
Much said about our name. To many people reading to much into it. We are lotus racing this season. Next season we are still lotus.
mraz,
We will see
Looking back, Fernandez’s chances in this ‘battle’ were always slim, the whole deal being a little shady.
Jakub,
Based on what evidence?
Jim – do you really think such tactics and back-ground manouverings make for a sustainable and solid business – let along F1 team? This will be horrid for all concerned.
I for one – and many many more were lured to the Lotus brand in F1. It represented both a new team, and a solid tradition. After losing Jordan I never found a new team to support, and I think many people were the same. This all alienates me more than I can say.
I still believe the fact the two teams/companies/factions of politicians are fighting against each other will lead to disaster for all concerned.
Joe – Lotus Racing are now recognised in F1, along with a currently legal and viable branding etc. They even seem to be the one ones to have the Bernies stamp of approval (though why he hates Virgin so much is an other story you may have covered the other day). Although they may not be able to use the Taam Lotus moniker.
So, can Group Lotus actually force Tony and Mike to stop using that name and branding? And therefore is it only ‘better judgement’ which is making the current Lotus team think about changing branding?
Surely the F1 powers that be can see how damaging all this looks and potentially even halt the ‘new’ Lotus? Bernie has stepped in and laid the law down for much less before.
Another vote here for Tyrrell, after all, that’s where Mike Gascoyne did his apprenticeship under Harvey’s legendary wing.
Trouble is, does the name still reside with Ken’s family, or is now owned by Mercedes (via Brawn via Honda via B.A.R.)?
The history and heritage of Team Lotus has been well documented in the last few months, not least by Joe and Adam Cooper. When one assumes all of that is true, it seems that Proton and Group Lotus have at least no moral right to claim ownership of the Team Lotus name.
I can’t believe therefore that anyone would seriously support and respect the Team Lotus name being hijacked through politics, from what has been the most respectable of the new teams this year.
IF Renault F1 does become Team Lotus and leaves Lotus Racing having to become something else, that seems to bring the F1 Sport more into disrepute than any of the recent scandals… a casual observer might overlook Ferrari’s race fixing and Stepney’s entrapment of McLaren, but how do you explain that from one season to the next, Lotus is two different teams who somehow swapped names?
if renault does become team lotus, why can’t tony fernandez buy the renault name to use in f1? then renault will have the same exposure they had this year with the renault team, as well as get paid for the exposure. effectively they can just swap the names of the 2 teams, can’t they?
joe , what jurisdiction have over a UK registered company
if there was a company registered in the uk called marks and spencers , could I set up a company with the samd name in malaysia , and operate world wide with that name
Joe – no evidence. I just wanted to play along with the Eminem theme and frankly, could not think of a better Slim Shady gag. Although, you must admit that Group Lotus look very determined and focused in their expansion, with F1 key to its marketing strategy, ala Ferrari. They have the money, ambition, and the all important F1 connections through Lopez. Therefore, it seemed to me that the Fernandez camp was facing an uphill struggle with regards to the F1 Lotus brand but found himself in a win-win situation. Clever stuff.
I don’t think the Team Lotus name will be used next year. If the informations here are correct, I bet that the Enstone outfit will be called Lotus Renault F1 Team and the Norfolk outfit will be called Team AirAsia.
This is all very messy. I just hope the Chapman family are not damaged if this all gets nasty.
Another layer of the story that will be the 2010 off-season….
Well, I’m slightly heartened by Tony’s twitter post regarding the name, I have to say.
And even if Tony has been shanked in the Malaysian halls of power, any name changes still need the approval of FOM/FIA, as DavidP and Chris Page point out. If Bernie went to Dany Bahar and said “Not going to let the Lotus name be moved from one team to another” I imagine all bets would be off.
And on the idea that Tony Fernandes is somehow an unworthy possessor of the Lotus name: the Chapman family are on side, David Hunt is on side, the corporation and the assets of the old Team Lotus belong to the new team, they’re based in Norfolk, there’s a Norfolk boy in charge of the racing, they’re by far the best of the new teams this year and will be better next year. That’s worthy enough for me.
Ash,
The Twitter post is interesting, but it is not what we are hearing from multiple good sources.
I have supported Lotus Racing this year and wish the two sides could have done a deal to work together. A shame. Will I support Lotus Renault next year? I’m a fan of Kubica (though not Petrov) and the enstone outfit are previous world champions, but I’ll need to see how they prepare the damage done by this mess and go racing. As for 1Malaysia i will greatly respect them but doubt I will be so keen without the Lotus branding. I guess that shows the power of the Lotus brand! That said as a scot I’m a huge Jackie Stewart fan and would love to see a shiny blue Tyrrell on the 2011 grid, it might just keep my interest in their great project…
What are the chances of the Group Lotus entry being Team Lotus next year, while the Lotus Racing entry becomes Torro Loto?
“jim,
If you love them so much, go buy a $125,000 Lotus…”
I have 5 on order. 😛 😛 😛 😆
I’m sure you fly Air Asia exclusively, since you love TF so much… 🙄
I hear that the legendary USF1 name is available for license from Ken Anderson (for a small fee of course) 😆
Tony can license it for a year, and then, the following year, when Ken has his funding lined up and wants to use the name again, Tony can throw a hissy fit and try and do an end run around Ken, by buying the USF1 name from Peter Windsor (Even though it’s not Windsor’s to sell).
He’d then threaten to rename a chain of hotels “USF1 hotels”, so that he can go into court and show the judge that he has something tangible named USF1.
Yes, TF certainly is a man to be admired… 🙄
I’m not sure how I feel about this really, on the one hand it is kind of nice for the Car company and racing team to be together again. I know Chapman allways kept them seperate but it is clear that they were “sister companies”. On the other hand I remain a bit un easy about the long term future of the road car and racing business under Bahar who seems a bit over ambitious and runs the risk of over extending both operations.
I also do feel sorry for Fernandes after all his efforts in re establishing Lotus in F1, although I’m sure he must get something out of the deal. Tony comes accross as a real racing enthusiast rather than cynical business man and I hope his team can continue with success. He certainly appears to be a much more affable chap than the rather more abrasive wide boy Bahar.
As always Joe you provide an interesting account and illuminating insight into this story of Lotus which by December, and the submission of Formula one entries for 2011, will hopefully be resolved.
Like many on here I do feel sorry for Tony Fernandes and the shareholders of Lotus Racing. They have done much to bring the name of Lotus (albeit not the one of Chapman) to Formula 1. However, I am a little sceptical about this story. One of the major authors of this current round of rumours is Jean –Louis Moncet, the same source who confidently announced last month that Tony Fernades had lost the support of the Chapman family. Something to which we have heard little of recently. This is not to doubt his credentials, however, another clanger like that will start to damage his excellent journalistic reputation.
As recently as the 13th of October Claudio Berro had mentioned that Lotus Cars had no plans on returning to F1 in the short-term. I don’t see any reason why that should change, although people are entitled to change their mind. To enter Formula 1 is horrendously expensive, if at the same time you are also returning to Le Mans, aiding a GP2 outfit, launching a raft of new cars, not to mention provide your own F1 style race series, redevelop your production facilities (including installing a F1 test track), reduce your UK dealerships to 3, and enter an Indy Car. Call me an old sceptic but just how much money does Danny Bahar have, and wouldn’t his backers be better of buying a Premier League team – after all, compared to the above the risk is considerably less.
I kind of see the point in a strategic partnership between Proton/Lotus and Renault. Lotus has used Renault products in its cars for decades, from the engine in the original Europa to the gearboxes used in Lotus Esprits. Renault also needs access to emerging markets.
However, if Lotus bought a controlling share of the current F1 team then it kind of makes a mockery of this whole argument regarding the legitimate owners of the Formula 1 side of Lotus. The Toleman/Benetton/Renault team is NOT, and has NOTHING to do with Lotus.
What this whole story does highlight is the power of the brand. The current Lotus is not the Team Lotus that went into liquidation in 1994. Much the same as the current Renault is not the Equipe Renault Elf of Alain Prost, Patrick Tambay and Rene Arnoux. Furthermore was it really the Bentley of W.O. and the Bentley Boys that won with the Speed 8 in 2003? Ironically enough, and returning the Lotus discussion, it was made in the same factory as the current Lotus Racing cars.
No doubt my naivety will see a Team AirAsia and a Lotus Renault next season. However, I do feel there is more to this story yet.
Lotus Cars as a company has little in terms of internal funds. Money comes from somewhere else for this.
I think this is linked to a Genii capital buyout of Lotus Cars and a subsequent pooling of genii assets together i.e. Lotus Cars and Renault-Enstone to get some kind of synergies.
So the malaysian gov’t is on-board. why? because genii capital buys lotus for a not-insignificant amount (and those who are in the know at Proton would know they’ve been looking for a Lotus exit for some time that would not put egg on their faces — especially if you remember the poor showing Proton had by selling their controlling stake in MV Agusta for 1 euro).
Genii capital (pure speculation) seems to have some strange Russian links and I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re russia + middle east funded. Just a rebranding of oil money to make it look kosher and acceptable in the west and get around all the KYC issues that are prevalent in business and sport.
There’s an obvious solution. Gascoyne & Fernandes rebrand as Caterham F1 next season. Simples! 😉