With CapEx, the four lower-ranking teams will be able to spend more money to (partially) fill the gap with the top teams. Williams rejoices while the Ferrari team principal is sceptical
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After weeks of negotiations, at the urging of the smaller teams led by Williams, the International Federation has made its decision in Qatar: the Formula 1 teams will have an additional sum, excluded from the budget cap limit, to spend on modernizing their structures . Technically we are talking about CapEx that is, capital expenditure, a figure already foreseen by the F1 financial regulation and which was originally set at 45 million dollars for the four-year period 2021-2024, which the teams could invest in development plans for their headquarters. At the urging of the small teams, the sum was changed upwards to adapt to inflation, but not in the same way for everyone: the ones who will benefit most from the budget increase will be the smaller companies, who will thus be able to have some extra money to fill the structural gap from the paddock giants.
20 MILLION EXTRA FOR SMALL PEOPLE
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The initial request of James Vowles, Toto Wolff’s former right-hand man at Mercedes who has been sitting on the Williams wall since this year, was 100 million dollars. In reality, according to reports Auto Motor und Sportthe concession was much less significant: for the four low-ranking teams – AlphaTauri, Sauber, Haas and Williams, in fact – the sum went from 45 to 65 million dollars for the four-year period 2021-2024, with the immediate result that those who had already spent all the money available to modernize the factory will now have another 20 million to implement some further improvements by the end of next season. The other teams will also have an extra budget but, similarly to what happens with the hours to be spent in the wind tunnel, the higher the ranking position (referring to past seasons), the lower the sum granted: thus, for Aston Martin, McLaren and Alpine the figure rises from 45 to 58 million dollars (13 million more), while Red Bull, Mercedes and Ferrari will only have an extra 6 million on the CapEx initially granted (it rises from 45 to 51 million).
THE NEXT FOUR YEARS
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The legislation will also change for the following period. If, originally, it was expected that teams could spend 36 million in the four-year period 2025-2028, also in the next four years the CapEx a criterion aimed at helping smaller teams will be followed (and, therefore, presumably with older infrastructures): the top teams will in fact have 42 million, the mid-range teams 49, while those at the bottom of the table will have 56 million to spend on improvements to the headquarters. Only from 2029, however, will all the teams once again be able to invest 36 million dollars on an equal basis. “It wasn’t the 100 million we were looking for – explained James Vowles, who in recent weeks had denounced the serious backwardness of the Williams factory in Grove – but certainly a step in the right direction. It is positive that an agreement has been found to close a discussion that began last February.” Ferrari boss Fred Vasseur, however, is less satisfied: “We have already opened the door a couple of times to changing the rules on the budget cap and I think this is very dangerous.”
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