F1 CEO Making It Even Harder For New Teams To Join The Grid
Formula 1 is considering the addition of a new team to the grid, with the entry process currently open until June. If accepted, the new entrant will have to pay a $200m 'anti-dilution fee' that will be shared among the existing 10 teams. However, F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali is considering raising this entry fee.
The $200m figure is supposed to represent the potential losses that each team could incur with an additional team taking some of the income away.
However, the sport has made significant progress since the fee was introduced with many factors such as Netflix's Drive to Survive and the cost cap increasing the values of the current teams. Due to this, the existing teams are now pushing for a revised entry fee amount with some figures as high as $600m being mentioned.
Domenicali, has always argued that a new team would need to add value to the sport in order to protect the business.
Speaking to F1 investors, as quoted by Autosport.com, Domenicali said:
"The process of having another team has been launched by the FIA. In our governance, in our Concorde, there's a possibility to do it.
"But the evaluation has to be done together to see from the technical perspective, from the sporting perspective, for the financial stability, and to make the bigger picture, if a new team will give value to the league, to the sport. And there will be a different position.
"And I go back to one point, the so-called anti-dilution payment was done at $200 million, just a couple of years ago. Because at that time no one would have expected that the value of this business would rise up so much.
"Today the situation is totally different, for sure. And it's our duty to make sure that we protect the business the best way that we can, and have a bigger picture.
"Today, there's so many [teams] that would like to come. There are teams that are more vocal than others, some of them are much more silent, but they are really expressing their interest.
"As always in life someone has to make that evaluation. And we're part of this process, and we're going to do the right thing at the appropriate time through this year."