Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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checkered
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Joined: 02 Mar 2007, 14:32

Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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Ecclestone might be many

a thing, but I highly doubt his working so hard to keep Super Aguri in F1 was an altruistic effort. No, it might be that some of his media arrangements state that this season 22 cars/11 teams will start each race - if not, he's obliged to reimburse for the "missing content". I wonder how the cost of this stacks up to $100M. While Honda GP may not be contractually liable for causing such losses by being instrumental in the affairs of Super Aguri, Bernie will be under no illusions as to the causality of the events and given the opportunity will surely yet extract his pound of flesh from those involved. He's famous for never giving anything for free, after all, and some reputations can only be backed up by solid track records.

Perhaps we'll soon see an effort to get some teams to run three cars. This would be telling with regard to the standing media contracts. In the present situation, without a Concorde agreement even, arranging for this will be exceedingly hard to manage without always treading on someone's interests. The ultimate irony would of course be if Honda was somehow forced to run the Super Aguri cars outside the constructors' points after having already accepted a sizable financial loss for alledgedly not finding a suitable investor! Surely this is doable and would be easier for other teams to swallow than, say, Ferrari and BMW Sauber being made to race third cars, mixing up the front of the pack far more and raising all kinds of questions about points, tactics and such. Of course Honda could chip in to get any willing team to field more cars in competition to themselves ... it wouldn't be that different from bankrolling Super Aguri!

I must say, contrasting startup customer teams with the prospect of three car mega teams, the first option sounds much better. In the grander scheme of things neither option is really appealing though. All in all, it could be that Honda will find that shedding Super Aguri has only put them more squarely in the thick of things. The team, apart from hiring Ross Brawn, has seemed unable to find a way out for a long while now. Doing this requires consulting the king of the jungle and approaching him without bearing substantial gifts after taking away his supper and leaving him hungry is ill advised.

At the beginning, Super Aguri seemed like a foolhardy effort with motivations that didn't translate easily. They soon grew to fulfill a promise that, in a sense, never was. I'm grateful that they did that, it clearly was a unique, beautiful and valuable contribution to Formula One. In a field of so few, even the loss of one is too much. Domo arigato, Super Aguri.
"In theory there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is." - Yogi Berra

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flynfrog
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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waynes wrote:expect Jenson to walk at the end of the season and hopefully replace Massa

all falling apart for the men from Japan

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: Why would any body want Button he has never delivered unlike Massa who can and does win races.

I expect when honda goes Jensson will follow Ralph and Jacques down wash out lane

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freedom_honda
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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flynfrog wrote:
waynes wrote:expect Jenson to walk at the end of the season and hopefully replace Massa

all falling apart for the men from Japan

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: Why would any body want Button he has never delivered unlike Massa who can and does win races.

I expect when honda goes Jensson will follow Ralph and Jacques down wash out lane
you do realise Massa is in a winning team but Jenson never get a car that is fast enough dont you?

ben_watkins
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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It's a real shame that a team has to be binned like this.. The so called sponsors who defaulted on their deal are to blame. Perhaps their contract wasn't so water tight and SA couldn't claim the money through the courts? Who knows.

All I know is I'm gonna miss seeing the SA cars running and challenging the bigger teams! :lol:

Now the grid is 2 teams short.. :cry:

I wonder what Bernie will do now?
BWP
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Belatti
Belatti
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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Jenson never managed to push up the team. Massa fell inside an already winning team. Neither is top of the class.
We have got only three drivers upon there.
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"I have no idols. I admire work, dedication and competence." -Ayrton Senna

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Ciro Pabón
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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Perhaps few drivers had the options Button had: he choosed his team, even paying for it. So...

As for Super Aguri it's amazing they hold for two years. I expected one year and then the sale. Bad timing.
Ciro

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WhiteBlue
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/67182

a good comment by Alan Baldwin considering that he forgets to mention it is first of all Bernie's failure to sort out the commercial detail for the concord. but that is the way of F1. never criticise Bernie or have a problem with your paddok pass.
Formula One's fundamental ethos is about success coming to those with the most ingenious engineering and best .............................. organization, not to those with the biggest budget. (Dave Richards)

ben_watkins
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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No that SA are in administration, perhaps Dave Richards should step up to the plate and buy himself a Prodrive F1 team.. I understood that SA had the IP to the chassis.. therefore only a customer engine to be sort and he has a chassis to build to join the grid in 2009?
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WhiteBlue
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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that is not an option for Prodrive. they wanted to go in with a cheap package and score points with a fast car. only after some years they would have invested in their own chassis design. they would have to do it right away to be able to run 2010.
Formula One's fundamental ethos is about success coming to those with the most ingenious engineering and best .............................. organization, not to those with the biggest budget. (Dave Richards)

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checkered
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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Just for the

record, PKF Accountants and Business Advisers' press release concerning Super Aguri.
PKF, in its press release wrote:Super Aguri Formula 1 Team – In administration

Administrators offer ‘turn-key’ motor sport operation for sale

7 May 2008: Corporate Recovery Partners Philip Long, Ian Gould and Brian Hamblin from PKF Accountants & business advisers were yesterday evening appointed joint administrators to the Super Aguri Formula 1 Team.

The joint administrators are seeking to sell the business as an on-going concern to a company or individual looking to launch a Formula 1 or other motor sport operation. Several expressions of interest have already been received.

The Super Aguri Team, based at the Leafield Technical Centre in Langley, Oxfordshire, has raced in Formula 1 since the 2006 season and finished ninth overall in the 2007 Constructors’ Championship. In addition to its two drivers, Anthony Davidson and Takuma Sato, the Team employs more than 90 people at the site.

The joint administrators were appointed by the company following its announcement that the team had withdrawn from the 2008 FIA Formula 1 World Championship and was ceasing racing activities with immediate effect.

In a statement, joint administrator Philip Long said: ”This Administration provides a unique opportunity to get into high-level motor sport without having to build an operation from scratch. In terms of capability a new team could easily be up and running for the 2009 Formula 1 season.

“Virtually everything is in place including the people, the technical expertise, the laboratories and testing facilities. A new team could walk in and take over a fully operational unit from day one. There are a number of other motor sport projects being undertaken which should interest the motor racing world.

“I am pleased that there has already been significant interest.”

-ends-
The optimism in that statement is in stark contrast to opinions expressed on Honda's part, expressly by Nick Fry, about the potential and viability of the team. That Super Aguri was forced to withdraw from the championship clearly made it more, not less, expensive and complicated to regroup the remaining human potential and technical assets in a revived F1 team. Weigl was ready to part with a considerable sum of money just to keep the option of purchasing the team in its working order open - with no solid guarantees whatsoever. And am I to take it that now, suddenly, Honda won't care anymore who uses their customer engines as long as they have adequate purchasing power to satisfy PKF's requirements?

It seems quite unlikely that there'd be investors with the prowess to pick up the pieces and hit the ground running. Perhaps some are indeed counting on this. In theory, enabling them to participate, even through the rest of the season is (and especially for those directly involved, frustratingly) possible still ... but realistically, in any scenario where a prompt return is the objective, the new team ownership will have to be secure in the knowledge that their customer relationship with Honda will hinge on nothing but money. Even if it is to be taken at face value that what remains of Super Aguri is a "turn-key" Formula One operation, those keys must be secured from Honda.

I don't know whether any solid figures from Weigl's offer have been released but I've seen suggestions that the running cost of the team through the rest of the season would've been around £6.5M. That's not prohibitive at all, quite a bargain in fact, save for the $100M or so that was funnily enough said to be "owed" by Super Aguri to Honda. If I were Aguri Suzuki I'd contemplate arguing that since the team had no sizable assets and virtually every resource came from Honda, and since he apparently couldn't acquire sponsors or investors without Honda's (or Honda GP's) explicit permission, then it must be that SA F1 never existed as anything other than a Honda front - voiding any outstanding liabilities and obligations as a separate team. This should have wider ramifications as well.

The running cost of £6.5M is actually a pretty titillating thought to expand on. If you had, say, 500k fans all willing to part with forty quid each (~80$ or 50€ currently, give or take), that'd make an operating budget of £20M/A (and then some, provided that all is not spent at once and the remaining nest egg pays interest as well). Call it the "Obama campaign model", transposed into Formula One ... Now, for how much did a fully serviced Cosworth CA2006 V8 go for, again? Yes, yes, such a proposition is endlessly wrought with complications, but since there are currently two less teams racing in F1 than was originally intended, I guess there are a few more idle synapses to come up with this stuff.
"In theory there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is." - Yogi Berra

puttenham
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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I believe each team has a deposit with F1 Administration similar to a performance
bond. The deposit is substantial. What happens to these funds now that Super Aguri
has withdrawn from competition? Are the funds transferred back to the team? Are they absorbed by F1 Admin? Has it been transferred Honda already?
puttenham

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WhiteBlue
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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I believe they do not collect this any more.
Formula One's fundamental ethos is about success coming to those with the most ingenious engineering and best .............................. organization, not to those with the biggest budget. (Dave Richards)

clean air
clean air
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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I believe Aguri posted the bond in 06 and it was returned after the season was completed.
40 million +

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checkered
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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Just archiving a couple

of links which have something to do with this issue. Turkish GP - Friday - Press Conference where Ross Brawn, Norbert Haug, John Howett and Frank Williams got asked about Super Aguri's withdrawal from F1. Q & A with Nick Fry deals exclusively with his, and Honda's, role.
"In theory there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is." - Yogi Berra

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checkered
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Re: Super Aguri : buyout / collapse

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Some more archiving

to do, as the fallout from Super Aguri continues. Thus far, nothing much coming from Bernie or CVC concerning the ramifications of losing a team ... or I haven't noticed it. Noting that the promoter of the Istanbul track is Ecclestone himself and that Honda/Fry went to "the track officials" to block SA from the paddock and pits, it could well be that Bernie was somehow satisfied that SA's demise would work out financially better for him and his partners than keeping the team in Formula One. While the "logistics in getting the trailers out are hard and we were avoiding embarrasment" argument is valid, I guess, it's hardly very convincing.

Perhaps something to do with easing the contractual situation, as has been suggested. Looking at the ambiguous state of Concorde as such, btw., I'm beginning to suspect that all (non?)parties to the (non?)agreement have found out that they can most efficiently evade outside scrutiny from state officials and such by neither admitting nor denying that there is an agreement and/or whether they're still signatories to it or not. The statements concerning this are bordering outright comical now, so perhaps some outside party should just devise a way to decide the issue for them.

F1nvestor - Super Aguri; An inconvenient truth? (Pitpass) A really insightful piece by Mark Gallagher, underlining how the larger framework will impose change on the sport. Things will happen sooner than the self-congratulatory F1 world perhaps appreciates, the current sales pitches already echoing rather hollow. I may not agree with him fully, but I always appreciate someone making his point so effectively. And here are two views from the privateers, as well ...

F1: Costs Still a Big Issue, Says Williams (SpeedTV, RACER)
Kolles: Independents have a future in F1 (Autosport)
"In theory there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is." - Yogi Berra