Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff has recently expressed his opinion about Red Bull’s poaching tactics. The Austrian has explained how the concept of poaching is nothing new as the Milton Keynes outfit has been doing it for the longest of times. Red Bull is perhaps poaching some of Mercedes’ engineers recently to help them with the new ambitious powertrains project they have taken up.
Since Red Bull are keen to provide their engines for the 2026 season, they undoubtedly need an experienced group of engineers. And which better team to recruit the engineers from than Mercedes, who won a record eight consecutive world championships during the turbo hybrid era (2014-21)?
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has defended his side’s tactics by explaining (as quoted by f1.com) how they will need the “brightest talent” to achieve success. And considering Wolff’s recent remarks, he seems to have no concerns.
Toto Wolff explains how poaching takes place “all the time.“
In a recent interview, Toto Wolff explained that he has no problem with Red Bull poaching some of his team’s staff that recently came to an “end of their working days.” When asked about the same, he replied (as quoted by crash.net), “We have a constant influx of Red Bull people, as we have from the other teams. The two of us are often discussing that. It is happening all the time“.
When it came to his staff joining Red Bull, Wolff added, “The people they’ve hired, we wish them the best. Some of them were retired from our organization and ended up there in a leading position, but that’s fine. They’ve been given a second lifeline“.
While Wolff has often expressed his frustrations with most of Christian Horner and Red Bull’s tactics, this seems to be an area where he has no problem. And it looks as if poaching is not just an issue between Red Bull and Mercedes, as Ferrari has also recruited some of the Milton Keynes outfit’s engineers.
Red Bull lost two employees at the start of this season to Ferrari
According to a report by Corriere dello Sport (as quoted by gpblog.com), at the beginning of the 2023 season, Ferrari successfully poached two employees from Red Bull. The report adds that since the two engineers face “gardening leave,” they can only begin working with Ferrari from next season onwards.
Gardening leave prevents employees from joining their new team immediately as they can pass on sensitive information that they received from their previous employers. Hence, since the Prancing Horse cannot use their services this year, they hope recruiting these two engineers will pay off for them next season.
