2023-06-27 17:20:09
The FIA is increasing the monitoring of team activities by talking to staff working on projects other than Formula 1, to ensure that the budget cap regulation is not breached.
Co-author: Aurélien Attard
44 m
As reported Motorsport.com last week, the FIA has closed a potential loophole in its regulations by prohibiting teams from transferring intellectual property from projects carried out outside their F1 activities without being subject to the budget cap.
The federation feared that several teams had taken advantage of a gray area to call on staff assigned elsewhere in order to thus obtain an advantage over the teams accounting for all their activities in their expenses.
Technical Directive TD45, which was issued earlier this year to end these practices, has now come into effect. This clearly states that from January 1 this year, any intellectual property passing from a technical department to an F1 team must be included in the expenditure linked to the budget cap.
The FIA takes the matter seriously and, in a much more detailed analysis of the teams’ activities, Motorsport.com learned that the governing body is carefully monitoring the staff of the teams. It is understood that the FIA now summons staff declared external to the budget ceiling in order to better understand the tasks entrusted to them.
Samples of work done by these staff are also reviewed to ensure they are completely separate from the team’s F1 effort and no knowledge is passed on. In addition, as part of the rigorous analysis that the FIA is currently carrying out on the 2022 financial year, the top teams must comply with a questionnaire comprising more than 100 points.
The teams welcomed the attention given by the FIA to the subjects which had raised concerns. Early feedback suggests that some teams have had to change their modus operandi. According to a senior source, “People didn’t trust the old warning system but now it looks like the FIA is on to it. It looks like it’s working”.
Christian Horner, Red Bull Racing Director, Toto Wolff, Mercedes F1 Director
TD45 has been written in such a way that special divisions, departments and subsidiaries can survive. It was clarified, however, that while the intellectual property acquired by a team might be transferred and used in activities other than those of F1, the reverse was not possible. The actions of the teams will continue to be monitored to ensure that they follow the rules and do not find other ways to circumvent the budget cap.
The teams must themselves put in place rigorous control procedures to ensure that their expenses do not exceed the limits set by the ceiling. During the Canadian GP, Toto Wolff explained that dozens of employees were responsible for checking the proper functioning of the team.
“We have set up, within our financial department, a large organization of 46 people who monitor the ceiling, down to the last screw”said the boss of Mercedes F1. “It takes into account the expenses made throughout the year and what we have done is allocate resources to different projects. We stayed below this line all last year, and we stayed in below that line this year. Assuming a normal course of development for next year, everything is going well.”
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