06/06/2024
NEWS STORY
Liberty CEO, Greg Maffei believes that F1 teams should follow the example of NFL, where, although rivals, the teams all work together for the betterment of the sport.
Seven years into its ownership of the sport, Liberty has no desire to follow the leadership philosophy of Bernie Ecclestone, who famously used 'divide and conquer' as a means of keeping an iron grip on the sport.
With the teams constantly sniping at one another, both on and off track, Ecclestone, especially with Max Mosley running the FIA, was able to keep the likes of Ferrari, Ron Dennis, Flavio Briatore and Frank Williams in line.
Though F1 has not yet officially adopted the franchise system of many American sports, the system is effectively already in place, hence the desire to see the likes of Andretti purchase an existing seat at the table rather than add a chair.
While Maffei wants to see the teams maintain hostilities on track, when it comes to the business side of things, especially as the sport works towards a new Concorde Agreement, he wants to see them working together for the good of F1.
"The prior regime really did put a lot of time in having the teams compete against each other," he said, clearly referring to Ecclestone. "In many cases, they enjoyed just getting an edge on each other, rather than thinking about how to grow the sport.
"We've tried to take really a page out of, I'd say in some ways, the NFL in the United States," he continued, "compete hard on Sunday, but on Monday it's league first.
"We really want to grow the sport together," he added. "The teams have embraced that, and profited from that, because they've not only seen the growth in F1 revenues and their share of the profits in their own sponsorship, but we've also seen growth in the value of teams.
"There are surely issues we're going to fight over," he admits. "What a surprise... they would like to make more money. I don't begrudge them that.
"I suspect some of that, they wish, might come out of our pocket. But in general, they appreciate we've tried to take the long view, and we try to take the view that we should all profit together."
Of course, one area where Ecclestone and Mosely tried, but failed, was a budget cap, something that was pushed through by Liberty in its first Concorde Agreement, which was negotiated at the height of the pandemic, a time when the sport was looking particularly vulnerable.
With the sport having successfully ridden out the storm, and now enjoying record revenues, Maffei admits that as Concorde negotiations continue the teams are going to push for a larger slice of the cake.
"I credit the leadership of Chase and the leadership of Stefano," he tells the James Allen on F1 podcast, "they've definitely tried to set a tone for the teams that we're not going to cut one-off deals.
"This is an open process," he adds. "The teams are making a lot more money, growth and sponsors, and that excitement has created goodwill.
"The teams and we will surely arm-wrestle over numbers," he admits. "You know, the teams would like more money, I wouldn't be stunned, and we might want more money, they shouldn't be surprised. That's going to happen."
"In general, there's pretty good feeling and agreement, and the things are working well," he says of initial negotiations, "and it's in our collective interest to get something solidified. There have been times when they started racing, without an agreed corporate agreement, and here we are several years before it expires, and we have confidence, we're going to get it done well in advance."
One-third of the way into the busiest calendar in the sport's history, Maffei admits that 24 races is enough, though, moving forward, there is doubt over the venues that will continue to host the sport.
"I think there's an opportunity in south-east Asia," he says. "We have interest from places like Thailand, and we have Indonesia and South Korea, can we meet them all now? No, we're locked. We're not going above 24 races, that is set. We actually have the right to go to 25 in the Concorde Agreement, but I think there's common agreement that 24 is where we're at, we're not going to go higher.
"We're also trying to think about the great historical venues, how do we balance them against new races?
"These are challenges, everybody wants to have a race. That's the good news. Who can have a race that's exciting for fans, that helps grow the base. That is a great experience that actually makes good money for the teams, and so that's a balance to try and think about where to grow."