The immigration people at Melbourne International might not know who Andy Palmer is, but this morning’s Etihad flight from Abu Dhabi brought the Aston Martin CEO to Australia for the launch this evening of the firm’s new F1 involvement. The details are still rather sketchy, with a lot of chat about Williams, but people seem too have forgotten that for almost a year now Aston Martin has been talking to Red Bull Technologies about a road car design project that will give Adrian Newey the chance to explore new avenues of design. The Newey name would be a sexy one for Aston Martin to have involved in a supercar project, and this had been on the cards for a while. The car would be exotic, expensive, small-volume but high profile and it would be no great surprise if there was to be some kind of an F1 sponsorship on the back of this. Aston does not have the money to pay big bucks in F1 terms, but there are always technology partnerships and other such titles that can raise the profile of a car company in F1. Having the Aston Martin wings on an F1 car would mean that Red Bull really will be giving you wings.
I think the important thing is that such an F1 involvement has a legitimacy on the back of a road car project, whereas a simply branding arrangement would be less convincing. There will inevitably be suggestions that this might lead Red Bull to Mercedes, because Aston Martin is part-owned by Merc and there is an road car engine deal between the two parties, but we will have to see if that actually happens. Much will depend, I suspect, on the future of Force India because if there is a Mercedes engine supply available for 2017 then Red Bull would be an interesting choice to beef up the Mercedes portfolio. It’s a balancing act though because you don’t want the factory team being beaten by the customers. Also you don’t want the Red Bull whingeing department in action in the newspapers. Having said that getting Red Bull into the manufacturer camp would a sensible move at a political level.
So, my bet is Red Bull Racing…
joeblogsf1 
and toro rosso? do you see it as a future Alfa Romeo? or Haas Ford eventually? i think that if the PU remains somehow stables, and a more flexible limitations to the PU developement during the season, maybe a few big names like that could be willing to return to F1. Bernie would like to have some big names like FOrd or VW to level the scale against Mercedes and Ferrari political weight.
At the risk of sounding like a corporate drone, Aston Martin probably want to skew younger as well.
I am on Cloud 9 at the thought of a Newey designed hypercar; would expect a lot of clever packaging ala Gordon Murray’s McLaren F1. An Aston Martin-Red Bull partnership would also do much to “youth up” the brand wouldn’t you say?
P.S. Do forgive the aviation geek in me Joe, but Etihad’s flights to Melbourne originate in Abu Dhabi. Palmer must have been in transit there.
it looks like it was true
Gosh. Amazing…
Great to see the “on track-on road” collaboration taking place between racing teams and the manufacturers! So it’s going to be Red Bull-Aston Martin Tag-Heuer?! Wow! 🙂 In a few years from now, I see Williams partnering with Jaguar as the revamping Tata Motors would love to leverage the F1 platform to push their global image and sales. The design and technological exchange will only be beneficial to both sides of the tarmac.
Welcome back to Aus Joe.
Adrian Newey’s involvement in an Aston Martin would be wonderful. It is give him and outlet to recharge his batteries. I think that his involvement with Sir Ben Ainslie’s America’s Cup project/entry helped in that respect also.
I fully expect Force India to morph into another team at some point given Vijay’s financial and legal problems. If a Mercedes power deal opens up in 2017, it would be a good thing for Red Bull because it would (in a way) marry to power brands and it could help Mercedes get access to its new target market while also increasing the brand recognition for both brands.
I have wanted there to be peace between Dietrich M., Helmut, Toto, and Niki for a while but my cousin’s stubborn streak (my father had it also) and probably a little pressure from the Daimler board prevented it. It’s time the Austrians played nice in the sandbox.
There are clauses that can be written into contracts to do deal with comments like what Red Bull said about Renault who where asleep at the switch at the beginning of the hybrids in F1. I think that Red Bull would be happy to have a Mercedes power unit that the clauses wouldn’t be necessary. It would also bring more competition to F1 which improves the on-track product which makes Bernie happy.
That will only happen if Mercedes should withdraw its works team at a certain time and leave their engines for customers. Not a single minute earlier. Connecting the partnership RB-Aston Martin automatically with a Mercedes engine contract is “counting 2 and 2 together and getting 6” (c by David Richards) 🙂
Red Bull goes for the youth market don’t they? Astons are sexy, but I’m not sure young people can afford them, so I’m not sure it would be such a good fit for Aston. Happy to be proven wrong.
I agree, it seems an odd mixture of brands, to me.
You don’t buy and Aston because you want to feel old…… Great call on which team they were going for Joe
Hi Joe,
Speaking of possible engine partnerships, if the new regs include a minimum number of teams each engine manufacturer must supply, how will this be enforced? Will Mercedes be forced to drop 1 or more customer teams? Any chance a team such as Force India would be prepared to swap to Honda, for financial gains and say, de facto B-Team status with McLaren? Honda must surely be keen on increased data.
Btw I booked my ticket today for tomorrow night! Can’t wait!
If I was Mercedes I would be offering Red Bull an engine for 2017, on the basis that they don’t break rank come Concorde Agreement 2020 negotiations.
Bernie only came to power in the 70s as he realized the teams were stronger when they acted as one, yet his power remains in the sport because of his ability to divide and conquer the teams. For the sake of the sport the teams need to hold hands a be friends for a while.
For someone who followed the likes of Lotus, Brabham and McLaren, when they were driven by comparatively simple mechanical innovation (anyone remember rising-rate suspensions?) this all seems to be various flavours of bullshit. F1 used to be the province of Colin Chapman, Ron Taurenac, Gordon Murray, at al … now I need a double espresso to keep me awake For an F1 race. Aston Martin, who effing cares … sorry but I am bored …
Newey is ‘cool’, Aston ditto, Rd Bull aren’t.
That depends on your target market.
Keep dreaming.
See the press release…
The first thing I came upon is what you wrote.
I wonder whether the rumoured Toro Rosso-Alfa Romeo partnership is still on the table. It would be interesting to see one Red Bull team backed by Aston, the other by Alfa.
Makes me think whether Red Bull is slowly decreasing its involvement in F1.
so what do you think about Mateschitz investing into building an engine for the cars – both F1 and roadcar – (they would probably need quite a bit of know how buy in though, Aston nor RBR has it currently) in the future too?
While a tie-up with Red Bull is probably the most likely choice, I think Aston Martin and Williams do have a common Bond theme with Aston providing the hero’s car and Williams engineering the villains’ Jaguar CX-75. Perhaps they could carry this “conflict” on to the track and put Spectre on the Williams end plates.
Branded as Red Bull Aston Martin, then?
/Branded as Red Bull Aston Martin, then?/
Not this season.
red bull aston martin with a watch branded engine.
The statement ‘you don’t want the factory team being beaten by the customers’ really depresses me. Surely for the good of the sport every team should be given the opportunity to win if they are good enough. This gives the impression that unless you are a manufacturer you are simply there to make up the numbers.
@Bruno. What I am sure Jo meant was that the manufacturers don’t want their works team beaten by a customer team (or any other team come to that). The same way that no team wants to be beaten by any of the other teams, they’re all in it to win. It would be very embarrassing for a manufacturer to explain to his main board why, their hugely funded works team has been beaten by ‘just a racing team using their engine!’
I don’t know about Jo, but Joe agrees…
Apologies for my typo Joe.
It’s not an impression, it’s the reality. Along with pay for view, it’s the biggest threat to the future well being of the Sport.
I see you bet was correct Joe….
Now that it is official I can say it is a shame. My love and estimation of the Aston Martin brand has gone down a couple of notches. Why sully their image by tying up with a bunch of moaning, self righteous, whingers.
How sad 😦
I realise that AM are not the same company that they used to be & that they are looking to expand both their range and market share – but given RB’s recent history & bad press over the ‘lets-publicly-slag-off-our-engine-supplier’ debacle that could have left them out in the cold, I can’t help but feel that this is not the best team to have chosen to achieve their aims.
Very happy to say that Joe was correct in earlier exchanges – One further point here though – Does this potentially mark the beginnings of Red Bull looking towards a parallel programme elsewhere in racing? Never Say Never Again! (crowbarred Bond reference!)
I can’t see much in this for Red Bull apart from two fingers to the other teams and another toy for their boy to play with. That is of course unless The Bolt gets his way and F1 cars become powered by road car derived V12’s.
From AM’s point of view a more compact AN-DB would mean that no one could get into one rather than just those vertically challenged as is the case today.
More seriously………
If Red Bull are planning their own “power unit” I can see the technology in that being of interest to AM.
Does this mean we will never, EVER, need to listen to the RB chiefs whining about how their going to leave F1 again.
Lets hope so!!
So I’m reading this after the official announcement. So let me get this straight?
Red Bull Racing will be:
– Using a Renault engine
– Which is branded / named by a watch company
– While a separate car company will be a technical partner but nothing to do with the engine?
– The technical partner will use RBR resource to design and market a super car, which will have a Mercedes derivative engine, which won’t be branded by the watch company or anything to do with Renault.
So all these sponsorship / partner packages are now totally arse about face. Well done RBR marketing department.
What really gets my goat is that personal relationships have come between what should have been a really great opportunity to get Aston Martin into the sport properly. From his Infiniti days Palmer obviously knows RBR very well and so has very clearly replicated the Infiniti deal. Anyone remember the Vettel 4×4 thing?
What a real shame that the correct pieces of the jigsaw couldn’t be put together to bring the much vaunted Johnnie Walker Aston Martin Racing Team. Now it is just another branding exercise with little to no added value to anyone. Nepotism.
What a shame.
In a sign that team/marketing associations matter, Aston Martin is no longer on my shopping list.
Was it ever?
Not really, unless they start making station wagons. But now, even if they do make station wagons, Aston will get no consideration at all. None!
The very thought of Red Bull getting a Mercedes engine next year leaves me cold. I can’t find any reason to like Red Bull. Their drink is awful and their attitude is appalling.
The only logical reason for that happening would be because Mercedes would be looking to stop running an F1 team.
You forgot the road car
As someone fortunate enough to own a couple of Astons, I have mixed views on this deal. On the one hand it is great to see Aston Martin in F1 (and before we all get carried away we should remember that the only previous Aston Grand Prix car, DBR4, was not a success as it was a front engined car when the championship winning cars were rear engined), but I would not see Red Bull as being an obvious partner for them at the moment. The whinging by senior Red Bull personnel last year has created a very negative view of their brand. Let’s hope this doesn’t rub off on others associated with the team ….
That’s a real shame – tarnishing the Aston brand with an association with Red Bull. 😦
+1
Benk. Agree!
Do you think the fact that Alexander Hitzinger, a man who knows all about hybrid, is no longer Porsche´s technical chief, is a coincidence?
“Aston does not have the money to pay big bucks in F1 terms”
But Matheschitz has them….. 🙂
Looking forward to the scene in the next Bond film where 007 dispatches a henchman using a can of Red Bull, raises an eyebrow and says: “It really does give you wings!”
But that aside, it’s got to be good news for F1. Would be a shame if the ‘works’ Astons disappear from Le Mans as a result, though. The DB11 would make a very pretty base to replace the current car and the NASCAR-on-steroids soundtrack is much appreciated.
Joe, do you think RB will fund a new Aston engine? maybe a development based upon the Mercedes power unit?
I think we are finally seeing the (lasting) damage a certain Indian gentleman has brought to the party. But hey ho, if ever there was a ducking and diving sport, this is it so nothing gets cast in stone for long.
Andy Palmer…… oh, that guy who thought a front wheel drive Nissan would beat Toyota, Porsche and Audi at LeMans, oh that guy, he’s got so much cred
No that was after he left
For what it’s worth, to anyone interested in a Marque as opposed to a “Brand”, Aston Martin as pure hand built British cars ceased around 1980 When Victor Gaunlett took over and started messing around with the make, doing things like the Tickford Capri, and the company was finished off by Ford in circa 1991 when they got overall control. Since then the make has been a mere shadow of its former glory, and not hand built in a complete engineering way.
The current vehicles are bitza built with Merc engines and other stuff, all hiding under the Aston Martin banner…..rather like having Seiko build Patek Phillipe watches and just rebranding them…it is a fraud on the buying public who just see the brand badge and assume it is something real and stand alone. As you will note, i’m appalled and disgusted that Brands are applied as mere badges to fool those with more money than knowledge of History. Still i guess this sort of thing fits modern F1 to a tee!
DC, I see your point and from an emotional standpoint agree. However, as a teenager, I worked for AC Cars in Thames Ditton, they built cars by hand too and never changed. Where are they today?
What Damian said is just sad. I hope that a 4th place for Daniel is an indication that Red Bull will do better this year. I don’t know if Dietrich M. would fund an Aston Martin power unit. Maybe if he knows that he has the people to work out the glitches so that there is good reliability to finish GPs so that points and podiums can happen.