F1 2022 will return to Albert Park Circuit in Australia this weekend for a third race. Off the track, new commercial forces are also keeping a close eye on this traditional motorsport that has shown significant signs of recovery in recent years.
The first commercial force came from major car companies, of which germany's Volkswagen Group is a typical representative.
The Audi brand, part of the Volkswagen Group, recently restarted negotiations for the acquisition of the F1 McLaren team. Founded in 1963 and officially debuted at the 1966 Monaco Grand Prix, McLaren is the second longest team in F1 history, behind Ferrari. In 2010, Ron Dennis, then Chairman of McLaren Group, founded McLaren Motors, moving from motorsport to the field of road cars, positioning itself as a manufacturer of high-performance sports cars.
However, with the blow of the epidemic, McLaren Automobile Group had to sell its assets to maintain its operations, selling its R&D headquarters building for about 1.7 billion yuan in 2020.
Nonetheless, the team's long history combined with its excellent record in recent years (three consecutive seasons in the top four of the constructors' standings) gives them strong bargaining power in potential deals and partnership negotiations. According to German media outlet Automobilwoche, Audi raised the acquisition offer from 450 million euros given in November last year to 650 million euros in this negotiation, an increase of 45% in half a year.
In fact, Audi's desire to buy the McLaren team is just one of the two-track policies of the Volkswagen Group that wants to return to F1 sports. Porsche, another brand owned by Volkswagen, also wants to cooperate with the Red Bull Team of last season's drivers' overall champion Max Verstappen as a supplier of power units.
The background of the potential business opportunity is that Red Bull Racing ended its partnership with former power unit supplier Honda last year. During the 2022-2025 period, Red Bull Racing will still be able to use Honda's engines. But before the new round of power unit overhaul in 2026, they need to plan ahead and lay out in advance for the next stage of competition.
In fact, after Honda's withdrawal, Red Bull Racing also set up a new Red Bull Powertrains Limited company in Milton Keynes, England, to be responsible for the research and development and maintenance of power units, but it is widely believed that for Red Bull, the more appropriate way is still to cooperate with powerful power unit suppliers as a customer fleet. According to the Motosport.com, the negotiations between Porsche and Red Bull Racing are "close to completion" and the two sides plan to cooperate from 2026.
Of the 10 participating teams in F1 2022, there are 6 manufacturers and 4 customer teams, in addition to 4 power unit suppliers supporting all 20 cars: Ferrari, Red Bull (i.e. Honda), Renault and Mercedes. If Audi and Porsche can join, it will also bring a new car company wrestling plot for the sport off the field.
In addition to the competition of car companies, the second commercial force is that as Travel in Europe and the United States gradually recovers, more and more tourist destination cities want to enter F1 through the form of competitions.
On March 31, Beijing time, F1 announced that the Las Vegas Grand Prix will join the F1 season in 2023. The tournament will be named after the city, which makes Las Vegas the fourth race to be named after a city, with the first three being Miami, Sao Paulo and Mexico City.
For F1, Las Vegas is undoubtedly a new city they want to embrace – free media said after taking over F1 in 2017 that they hope the F1 Grand Prix will go to more "destination cities". Las Vegas, a drunken fan, is believed to be loved by F1 drivers and fans.
According to the Times, the Las Vegas station will be scheduled for the end of November and will be the first Saturday race in 28 years since 1985 in South Africa, choosing to start at night is considered to take care of the viewing habits of European audiences, and choosing Saturday is considered to avoid colliding with the NFL.
What is more interesting is that in the process of introducing the Las Vegas Grand Prix, F1 itself will also act as a promoter, which means that F1 will not charge the promotion fee as before. But F1 will share all the revenue from the event with partners.
In addition to the Las Vegas government, the partner is also the world-renowned entertainment company Live Nation, which wrote in the official website introduction: Live Nation is growing into the world's largest concert search engine, dedicated to helping live music lovers find concert tickets more easily and quickly.
Several casinos, including Caesars Entertainment and MGM Resorts International, will also be the initiators of the event along with F1, as the core appeal of street racing is to use the Las Vegas Strip and to be cooperated by this big casino.
In terms of the Chinese market, Zhou Guanyu, the first Chinese regular racer in F1 history, played a remarkable role in the first two stops of the season, and the first leg of his career to gain points made domestic car fans even more excited. This also provides a new opportunity and story for Chinese brands to enter the F1 sport outside the arena. Ammus and Hennessy have signed Zhou Guanyu as brand ambassadors, with the former working with Alfa Romeo since September 2019 and the latter being considered a new entrant.
In addition, industry insiders told Lazy Bear Sports that there are still some domestic technology brands with "overseas marketing" needs, and have begun to contact the teams in the paddock, hoping to use the global influence of the F1 season to enter the F1 market in the future.
Unfortunately, so far, the domestic new media copyright negotiations have not made progress, and important channels such as CCTV have not been broadcast for a long time, which has also reduced the ability of the event to break the circle.
On the other hand, due to the cancellation of the Russian leg this season, some media believe that the Chinese leg will be expected to return to the calendar in the second half of the year. However, as far as the current situation is concerned, the holding of the F1 Grand Prix will face a huge risk of entry epidemic control, and there is still great uncertainty at this stage.
However, according to Lazy Bear Sports, after Liberty Media acquired F1 Holdings in September 2016, it also hopes to actively promote F1's "second stop in China" plan. In September 2020, the Chengdu Tianfu International Circuit, invested by Geely Group, held a groundbreaking ceremony with a total investment of 3.5 billion yuan, which is composed of a class 2-2 road track (which can be upgraded to a class 1 track) certified by the FIA, and automobile commercials.
In the latest disclosed financial data, the total revenue of F1 in 2021 rose by 87% year-on-year to $2.14 billion, and achieved a profit of $40 million, the world's most money-burning sport is gradually emerging from the impact of the epidemic.
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