Ferrari is ready to have a brand new driver for the 2025 Method 1 season, with Lewis Hamilton leaving Mercedes on the finish of the 2024 marketing campaign to affix the Italian flagship for subsequent 12 months.
Now, based on studies, Ferrari will add a brand new title sponsor in addition to a brand new driver.
As first reported in SportBusiness, Hewlett-Packard (HP) is poised to affix Ferrari as their title sponsor. If the deal does undergo, HP will change into the crew’s first title sponsor for the reason that 2021 season, when Ferrari was partnered with tobacco large Philip Morris and competed as Scuderia Ferrari Mission Winnow.
In response to SportBusiness, the proposed deal is on par with the title sponsorship relationship between Pink Bull and Oracle, which in the intervening time is probably the most profitable within the sport. “Sources say the deal’s annual worth is similar to Pink Bull Racing’s title sponsorship take care of expertise firm Oracle, which is at present probably the most beneficial of its variety in F1,” writes Matthew Williams in SportBusiness.
Why may this matter? As Williams notes, driver contracts don’t fall underneath the game’s “price cap,” leaving groups the liberty to pay drivers with out impairing crew operations. With Hamilton’s Ferrari contract rumored to be within the $100 million vary, bringing HP aboard as a brand new title sponsor will ease that burden.
“Ferrari’s take care of HP will assist the crew afford the wage of seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, who will change Carlos Sainz [Jr.] in the beginning of subsequent season,” writes Williams. “Driver salaries don’t rely towards Method 1’s ‘price cap’, permitting groups a limiteless spend on star acquisitions.”
This isn’t HP’s first foray into F1. The crew sponsored Williams from 2000 to 2005, and Hewlett-Packard Enterprises (HPE) has a present relationship with each Mercedes and Sauber. (Hewlett-Packard Firm spun off two divisions to create HP and HPE, with HP specializing in {hardware} whereas HPE focuses on servers, storage, and networking.
This season, Ferrari seems to have maybe closed the hole to Pink Bull on the entrance of the sector, because the Scuderia at present trails Pink Bull by 44 factors within the Constructors’ Standings and Sainz as the one non-Pink Bull grand prix victory, as he did a season in the past.
Maybe the hope in Maranello is that Hamilton, and HP, may also help them bridge that hole to Pink Bull much more.
