McLaren CEO Zak Brown says the investment deal announced at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix has "bolstered" the plan to once again win in Formula 1.
This year, the Woking-based team has been forced to scramble somewhat to keep the company solvent due to the financial impact of Covid-19, which has severely dented revenues both in their road car and racing divisions.
Loans and the ongoing sale of the McLaren Technology Centre have helped raise funds but speaking at Yas Marina, McLaren Group executive chairman Paul Walsh was asked if there was ever a risk the Racing arm could collapse...
“I think that’s quite hypothetical," he was quoted by Crash.net.
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“If we look back to the impact of the pandemic, we stopped making cars because our factory was locked down. If you don’t make cars, you don’t sell them and if you don’t sell them you don’t get the cash flow in.
“Yet equally we have our racing team which was continuing to spend money, as they should. That tension made everyone acutely aware that the fundamental financial model needed adjustment.
“We could have just trimmed our sales, and we could have just dialled Zak [Brown] back on the money that he could spend, but then we would also have had to be true to ourselves that we would have been dialling back on our ambitions,” he added.
“We didn’t like that, so basically what we’ve tried to put in place here, is how can we have a fiscally appropriate model for the group but also equip Zak and the team to go win and that’s what I think we’ve accomplished.
“Now you can speculate that in four years time had we done this what would have happened? I don’t know. But here we have our cake and we can eat it and we can play to win.”
Indeed, McLaren secured a £185m investment by American company MSP Sports Capital for an initial 15% stake in the Racing division, which will rise to 33% by the end of 2022.
And Brown sees that financial boost as critical to continuing the progress the team has made in F1 in recent years.
"The investment bolsters our plan to return McLaren to contention for race wins and championships in Formula 1," Brown stated, confirming the team will now also operate at the $145m budget cap level next year.
“I think we have everything we need. It will take time. McLaren are a team on their way back to the front but there’s still some time needed to get there.
“Andreas Seidl [team principal] has done an unbelievable job leading the Formula 1 team. We’ve got two great drivers. We’ve got the Mercedes power plant. We’ve got fantastic men and women at the racetrack and back at the factory all contributing towards this race car to make it go as fast as possible.
“I think we need some time for it all to come together, but I don’t think there are any pieces to the puzzle missing now. We’ve just got to put the puzzle together.”
