The official F1 2025 silly season *contains speculation.*
Discussion
TheDeuce said:
I think we're looking at this from two different angles.
The fact they haven't entered F1 doesn't mean they don't want to. 'officially' they may want to very much, I think there's reasonable evidence of that.
The fact is that they haven't actually entered granted... But that doesn't mean they're not courting or being courted and would love to jump in to bed - providing F1 gives them what they need commercially.
VAG are the biggest car company in the world, and the seventh biggest company on the world. They could buy F1 and every team in it if they really wanted to. The fact they've never entered as a team or engine supplier says everything about their interest in F1, especially considering they almost had an engine ready to go, apparently. They've also let everyone within VAG who you would consider a candidate to run their F1 programme leave within the last couple of years - Seidl, Capito, Domenicali...The fact they haven't entered F1 doesn't mean they don't want to. 'officially' they may want to very much, I think there's reasonable evidence of that.
The fact is that they haven't actually entered granted... But that doesn't mean they're not courting or being courted and would love to jump in to bed - providing F1 gives them what they need commercially.
By not entering but feigning interest every few years they are continually talked about in regards to F1. Job done and it costs them almost nothing. Compare that to how much Renault actually spend on F1 for how little they are talked about.
VW aside, for the sake of this thread I'm going to make a prediction: The revised PU spec will feature increased electrification in some way.
The extent of which will probably be a balance between being sufficient to attract a new PU supplier to the sport whilst not being so radical as to push away existing suppliers.
I don't think anyone new will enter as a supplier at this stage with further electrification, on the basis that it's a commitment that lasts many years at which point it's at least 2030 and the sort of weak electrification we have today will be so out of date with what they want to sell at that point.
The extent of which will probably be a balance between being sufficient to attract a new PU supplier to the sport whilst not being so radical as to push away existing suppliers.
I don't think anyone new will enter as a supplier at this stage with further electrification, on the basis that it's a commitment that lasts many years at which point it's at least 2030 and the sort of weak electrification we have today will be so out of date with what they want to sell at that point.
thegreenhell said:
TheDeuce said:
I think we're looking at this from two different angles.
The fact they haven't entered F1 doesn't mean they don't want to. 'officially' they may want to very much, I think there's reasonable evidence of that.
The fact is that they haven't actually entered granted... But that doesn't mean they're not courting or being courted and would love to jump in to bed - providing F1 gives them what they need commercially.
VAG are the biggest car company in the world, and the seventh biggest company on the world. They could buy F1 and every team in it if they really wanted to. The fact they've never entered as a team or engine supplier says everything about their interest in F1, especially considering they almost had an engine ready to go, apparently. They've also let everyone within VAG who you would consider a candidate to run their F1 programme leave within the last couple of years - Seidl, Capito, Domenicali...The fact they haven't entered F1 doesn't mean they don't want to. 'officially' they may want to very much, I think there's reasonable evidence of that.
The fact is that they haven't actually entered granted... But that doesn't mean they're not courting or being courted and would love to jump in to bed - providing F1 gives them what they need commercially.
By not entering but feigning interest every few years they are continually talked about in regards to F1. Job done and it costs them almost nothing. Compare that to how much Renault actually spend on F1 for how little they are talked about.
Precisely die to the scale of vag, getting F1 right is a massive gamble. It has to be the perfect deal or they'd be mad to go for it. As a group they're more heavily invested in electrified cars, per car, than even Mercedes.
I do understand the practice of feigning interest for the sake of raising headlines - Horner spouts s
t several times a week for no other reason... But that doesn't automatically mean that VW aren't looking at F1 and wondering if they could do a Mercedes..I've mumbled about it a few times, but if we're going bold predictions, I'll guess that it'll be a Porsche badge on the Red Bull engine with some eco bumff about Porsche's synthetic fuels as part of the marketing angle 
I just think this time with VW might be different because you've got the Red Bull engine option, it means they don't have to spend the money themselves developing the engine from scratch whatever the regs are, don't need to invest in the tools and manpower to actually manufacture / develop the engines once up and running, but can still have the badge on the car
I just think this time with VW might be different because you've got the Red Bull engine option, it means they don't have to spend the money themselves developing the engine from scratch whatever the regs are, don't need to invest in the tools and manpower to actually manufacture / develop the engines once up and running, but can still have the badge on the car
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