Breaking News: Red Bull Racing buys out Minardi!

[Jack_Bauer]

Well, there had been a few rumours flying about that Red Bull weren't gonna be content with just the one team. Now it seems it's official...

Red Bull have reached an agreement with Paul Stoddart to buy Minardi, they confirmed at Spa-Francorchamps on Saturday.
The soft drinks giant, who already own Red Bull Racing, will take control of Minardi on November 1, when they will set about shaping an independent team designed to nurture drivers on their development programme.

Stoddart had held talks with Red Bull over the last week and they have on Saturday concluded an agreement which the Australian aviation millionaire hailed as "good news for Minardi".

Full press release...

Today, at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit, an agreement was reached whereby, from 1st November 2005, Austria's Red Bull GmbH will take over all the company shares of the Minardi Formula 1 team and will be responsible for running the team. Red Bull will therefore run two Formula 1 teams from the start of the 2006 season onwards.

The second team will be positioned as a "Rookie Team" and this and the current Red Bull Racing will operate independently of one another and compete against one another on the track.

The main reasons for Red Bull deciding to enter a second team starting in the 2006 Formula 1 World Championship are:

1. Red Bull has more talented drivers than it has available cockpits. This meant there were only two ways of helping up-coming drivers: either place them in other teams or to increase the number of cockpits available to us. After much careful thought, Red Bull decided to go with the second of these options.

2. Looking at the current state of Formula 1 we feel that the second team will be able to maintain its current assets while also being able to generate its own income in the future, in order to become almost self- financing.

3. This acquisition also means that Red Bull now has a second vote in any matters raised regarding the future of Formula 1.

At the moment, no decisions have been taken as regards the name of the team, its management nor its drivers.

Seems the Red Bull boss isn't content with just owning one back marker team, he wants a whole collection of back markers!

But seriously, it's good to see that they're clearly determined to make themselves a genuine force in the world of F1, which can only be good for the sport IMHO.

[gregvl52]

Sorry for the off topic question, but... where does Red Bull get all this money from? Does this soft drink giant make anything besides Red Bull?

[lukeh]

I hope the young F3 driver Sebastion Vettel gets a seat in one of these F1 red bull cars he is definently one of the most tallented drivers in Germany at the moment domenating the Formula BMW in 2004 with 18 wins from 20 races and when he didnt win he got 2nd and 3rd. right now he is gaing posistions considerabley fast in the F3.

[Vaigra]

that's good news, at least we've got less chance of losing a team now, since Minardi were always £1 above broke lol. I would like them to stay as "Minardi" though, it just seems right, eventhough I know it's not going to happen

[pimento]

Mayhaps Vaigra, they shall be 'Red Bull Minardi.'

[lightweight]

It's good for the spectator when money poors into the sport. I wanted this to happen because Minardi was uncompetitive for a long time now.

I respect that Stoddart has a business to run, but his primary goal was profit. Because profit was his first priority, the performance of his cars suffered. Minardis were nothing more than moving advertisements with paydrivers.

It would be good if McLaren materialised the rumoured B-Team. More competition would be welcome.

If all teams had big bucks and the FIA could implement rules that would keep costs logical, then the sport would go back to its former glories.

[Jack_Bauer]

I hope the young F3 driver Sebastion Vettel gets a seat in one of these F1 red bull cars he is definently one of the most tallented drivers in Germany at the moment domenating the Formula BMW in 2004 with 18 wins from 20 races and when he didnt win he got 2nd and 3rd. right now he is gaing posistions considerabley fast in the F3.

Well at the moment Red Bull have 4 drivers on their books for next year: Coulthard, Klein, Liuzzi, Speed. I would imagine it would be DC and Klein at Red Bull Racing again next year going by current form. I think they'll probably give the 3rd driver spot at RBR to Scott Speed to give him some experience. That leaves Liuzzi as the most likely to get a seat at Red Bull/Minardi with another. This season Albers has been fairly impressive, and Doornbos also looks half decent from his brief appearances so far, so I would have thought they'd keep one of them. There are also rumours that Renault are trying to buy a seat in one of the smaller teams for their young hotshot Heikki Kovaleinen, and Minardi were the team rumoured to be most interested.

It certainly limits the options for any prospective pay drivers coming into the sport. It used to be a foregone conclusion that Minardi would have two spaces up for grabs for the highest bidder. Now it looks as though Red Bull can afford to be more selective in their driver choices and get some more competitive drivers into their seats.

The big issue at the moment seems to be that there are many bright young talents around and not enough F1 seats for them. There are the likes of Kovaleinen, Speed, Rosberg, Piquet Jr, Carroll in the highly competitive GP2 series. There is also Antony Davidson who finally looks as though he's gonna get his chance with Jordan/Midland. Then there are drivers like Lewis Hamilton in F3 who is pitched as being THE big sensation in the upcoming seasons, but it's hard to know where he's gonna go at the mo. And also there are people who aren't on the usual European single seater convyor belt career path like Gary Paffett in DTM (probably my fave driver at the mo), and there are always the rumours about Champ Car/IRL drivers like Bourdais, Wheldon and Dominguez maybe getting a shot.

[Matra et Alpine]

re Red Bull income.
Check out the price per litre of those little tins.
It's only water, sugar and caffeine.
HUGE mark-ups and had years as "the trendy drink"

[Rockefella]

re Red Bull income.
Check out the price per litre of those little tins.
It's only water, sugar and caffeine.
HUGE mark-ups and had years as "the trendy drink"

It's 2 dollars for like 9 oz of Red Bull, I think the correct number is like 8.7 or 8.9 ounces. And like Matra said, it's a trend, and it tastes good, so it sells like wildfire.

I'm guessing RB makes 1.75 on every drink they sell, multiply that by all the drinks they sell, and well, you get the picture.

EDIT: 8.3 oz in a red bull. 265 million cans of RB were sold in Britain in 2000, so the number of RB drinks sold each year is probably around 1.5 billion, EACH year. RB prob. makes 800-900 million in profits each year, just from the drinks.

[lightweight]

I'm guessing RB makes 1.75 on every drink they sell, multiply that by all the drinks they sell, and well, you get the picture.

Such a huge profit margin is excluded by facts alone. No market can support a profit of 85%. Competitors would come up with a similar product and take a big market share. Then they would have to reduce the prices in order to get more competitive. Thus the profit margin would shrink.

[Matra et Alpine]

Such a huge profit margin is excluded by facts alone. No market can support a profit of 85%. Competitors would come up with a similar product and take a big market share. Then they would have to reduce the prices in order to get more competitive. Thus the profit margin would shrink.

WHERE did you get the 85% number.

BRAND management can clearly create a profit well in excess of that.

It takes a while for others to break in and take sufficient market share.
The response to that is NOT necessariy to drop the profit value as it may not be worth it.

[lukeh]

Well at the moment Red Bull have 4 drivers on their books for next year: Coulthard, Klein, Liuzzi, Speed. I would imagine it would be DC and Klein at Red Bull Racing again next year going by current form. I think they'll probably give the 3rd driver spot at RBR to Scott Speed to give him some experience. That leaves Liuzzi as the most likely to get a seat at Red Bull/Minardi with another. This season Albers has been fairly impressive, and Doornbos also looks half decent from his brief appearances so far, so I would have thought they'd keep one of them. There are also rumours that Renault are trying to buy a seat in one of the smaller teams for their young hotshot Heikki Kovaleinen, and Minardi were the team rumoured to be most interested.

It certainly limits the options for any prospective pay drivers coming into the sport. It used to be a foregone conclusion that Minardi would have two spaces up for grabs for the highest bidder. Now it looks as though Red Bull can afford to be more selective in their driver choices and get some more competitive drivers into their seats.

The big issue at the moment seems to be that there are many bright young talents around and not enough F1 seats for them. There are the likes of Kovaleinen, Speed, Rosberg, Piquet Jr, Carroll in the highly competitive GP2 series. There is also Antony Davidson who finally looks as though he's gonna get his chance with Jordan/Midland. Then there are drivers like Lewis Hamilton in F3 who is pitched as being THE big sensation in the upcoming seasons, but it's hard to know where he's gonna go at the mo. And also there are people who aren't on the usual European single seater convyor belt career path like Gary Paffett in DTM (probably my fave driver at the mo), and there are always the rumours about Champ Car/IRL drivers like Bourdais, Wheldon and Dominguez maybe getting a shot.

LEWIS HAMILTON, he is no big sensation this is his 3rd year in the F3 and he has justed started to win as to Sebastian Vettel it is his first year and he has had alot of problems at the start of the year but I think he will take his first win next race at hockenheim.

[Jack_Bauer]

LEWIS HAMILTON, he is no big sensation this is his 3rd year in the F3 and he has justed started to win as to Sebastian Vettel it is his first year and he has had alot of problems at the start of the year but I think he will take his first win next race at hockenheim.

No big sensation?!?!

First of all, this was only second season in F3 and he won his first race over a year ago at the Norisring, finishing 5th in the championship in '04. He also won the non-championship Bahrain Superprix. This season he won 11 of the first 16 races of the season, most of those without breaking into a sweat, and clinched the title with 4 rounds left. He would've had another victory and clinched the title much earlier had he not been part of a group of seven cars DQ'd for minor technical infringements at Spa. He has been in a completely different class to everyone else in the Euroseries (including Vettel). Hamilton was plucked from the Junior formulae by Ron Dennis personally at the age of just 13, the first time Ron Dennis has taken on a protege in such a fashion. It is pretty much a foregone conclusion that he will drive for McLaren at some stage in the future, probably after a year or two at GP2 level.

I'm sure Vettel is a promising young driver, but at the moment he is a LONG way behind the standard of Hamilton.

[lightweight]

WHERE did you get the 85% number.

Well. Rockefella said that if RB costs 2 pounds, then 1,75 is profit.

BRAND management can clearly create a profit well in excess of that.

It takes a while for others to break in and take sufficient market share.
The response to that is NOT necessariy to drop the profit value as it may not be worth it.

Brand Management can do many things, but if there was a market with 85% profit margin, then it would be full of competitiors in no time. Of course the competitors would need some time to adapt, but RB has been around for a while now.

Of course there are various strategies that could be imlemented, but I think that price is the main factor that determines competition. Let alone in a product with 85% profit.

I have an idea!!!!! Does anyone have access to Red Bull's annual Budget of 2005? It would solve the problem

[sunk]

Doesn't Minardi win powerboat racing evertime?
Is their team serious about racing or is a marketing PR?