“It’s a better outcome than having three cars per team” – Alpine executive director Marcin Budkowski wants more teams to join the sport, but only if they add real value.
Formula 1 has a $200 million anti-dilution fee mandated for any team wanting to join the sport, as per the Concorde Agreement. The large sum is proving to be a hindrance for prospects to join F1, and when Alpine boss Marcin Budkowski was questioned if it should be scrapped, he chose to answer in very layman terms, ultimately advocating for more teams to join the sport in the upcoming seasons.
“It’s a complicated question. I’m going to try to give a simple answer.
“It would be good to have more teams in Formula 1. I think we would all welcome that. But they need to be the right teams and they need to bring value to the sport and I think that’s one of the reasons that the anti-dilution fee was brought in, to make sure that people who come are really financially sound and solid, to be able to run a Formula 1 team, which as you know is a very expensive business to run.
“Equally, it was also a way to ensure that when the Concorde Agreements were negotiated that all the teams would be reassured that the cake wouldn’t be split in more slices, with newcomers entering the sport in an uncontrolled manner.
“It was a measure that was mostly brought in to give confidence to the existing 10 teams that they would be looked after if there were new teams coming.
“Should that be scrapped? To be honest, it’s a question for the commercial rights holder, a question for Stefano [Domenicali, F1 president] in that case.
“But yeah, more teams would bring more diversity to the sport, bring more drivers in the sport for sure. I think it’s a better outcome than having three cars per team as has been mooted by some other people in the recent past.”
