16/07/2023
NEWS STORY
F1 CEO, Stefano Domenicali remains vehemently opposed to any new teams joining the grid.
Along with the majority of the teams, the former F1 boss, has not held back on his objection to the concept of fresh blood entering the sport, seemingly using any excuse possible, be it logistics, safety, sustainability, the purity of the sport's DNA and, of course, money.
Indeed, while McLaren and Alpine are the only teams that have voiced any kind of support for the idea of a new entrant, the only other welcoming voice has been that of (FIA president) Mohammed ben Sulayem, who has clashed with F1 bosses on a number of issues… hence the fact that he has essentially been air-brushed out of the picture.
Speaking this week, as the deadline by which prospective teams had to register their interest passed, Domenicali doubled-down on his objection.
"I'm not changing my mind," he told Motorsport.com. "It's not the money, as we have said, and I don't want to anticipate anything because there is a process and I think that I have respect for the fact the FIA launched their process, and very soon we will arrive at the conclusion.
"As we always said, we need to make sure that the decision is right for the business," he added. "And this is what I think is the duty of the FIA and us together, that has to be taken. So that is another decision that will be taken in the next couple of months."
It's understood that there are five prospective teams looking to enter the sport - Andretti, Carlin, Hitech, Formula Equal and LKY SUNZ - Andretti, in a bid to give more weight and prestige to its bid, having announced a partnership with General Motors brand Cadillac.
Asked if he see positives to the Andretti bid, Domenicali admitted: "There are positives and negatives, that's part of the evaluation that we're doing. So I cannot spoil or anticipate anything.
"We are doing things very seriously and correctly. So as soon as we will be ready for that discussion we're going to inform, as a discussion we're going to take it with the FIA together."