Cosworth boss Bruce Wood admits there is a “certain logic” to his company teaming up with Aston Martin and helping the British luxury carmaker join Formula 1 as an engine supplier from 2021.
Aston has been one of the more vocal companies in revealing their ambition to take advantage of a simplifying and cheapening of the current hybrid engines which owners Liberty Media hope to introduce in three years time, after increasing their presence by becoming title sponsor at Red Bull starting this year.
However, without the resources of Renault or Ferrari and with Cosworth also wanting to return to the sport, Wood believes it makes a lot of sense for the two to join forces, with preliminary talks reportedly taking place.
“We’ve done a lot of work with Aston for many years, we’re working very closely with Red Bull and the team for the Valkyrie [hypercar], so there’s a certain logic to it,” he said, speaking to Motorsport.com.
“Aston have been very clear that they want to be doing something more than just badging someone else’s engine. They also don’t aspire to design it all themselves, so there’s a natural fit there and that’s where some of those discussions are happening.
“There’s definitely a desire to do something together.”
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Much like Aston, however, the final decision will depend on the financial viability of an F1 project and that may mean even 2021 is too soon for a partnership to come together.
“It isn’t like when we were owned by Ford as a cost centre to put Jaguar on the F1 grid. Anything has to be profitable and certainly, that is easier to do if you’re sharing those costs with someone else,” the Cosworth boss continued.
“Our view is it would be a huge investment for whoever was going to do it and it probably isn’t realistic to get everything in place for 2021 but that doesn’t make us think we should forget it. It just makes us think about how 2022 would work.”