HONDA SAYS SAYONARA – SORT OF
Red Bull learned in
July 2020 that Honda would cease its works involvement in Formula 1 at the end of 2021. The company attempted to persuade Honda to remain involved, but the call to end official support proved to be irreversible.
“I think if we would have this sort of success in 2020 already, maybe they would have changed their opinion,” Helmut Marko noted during last year’s successful campaign. “Because they see now what sort of publicity they get, how big Honda is on the car, and so on. But once a decision is done in Japan, it’s done.”
The alternative strategy was to persuade Honda to keep supplying its engines, but on a customer basis, paid for by Red Bull.
“We very quickly came to the conclusion that if we could work out a deal with Honda, based on the progress and the skill set that they have within the group, that would be by far our best chance of competitiveness,” explains Christian Horner. “We could take control of our own future with a powertrain.”
Red Bull set the wheels in motion to set up its own powertrains division in Milton Keynes. The new company had two main aims – to oversee the supply of the Honda power unit until the end of the current formula in 2025, and to develop a bespoke engine for the new rules due to come into force in 2026.
Horner successfully headhunted several key players from Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains, notably
Ben Hodgkinson, who was named technical director in April 2021. Other key EX-HPP hirings soon followed.
Over 100 people have now transferred straight from Honda’s European division to Red Bull
Powertrains, while earlier this year it was announced that erstwhile F1 boss Masashi Yamamoto had left the manufacturer to become a consultant, liaising between Red
Bull and Japan.
The original plan was for Honda to supply complete power units in 2022 before RBP took over their assembly. Marko subsequently revealed that the engines will continue to come from Japan until 2025. That will help Honda preserve its IP, while also ensuring that RBP is seen as a new supplier in 2026, and can therefore benefit from concessions such as extra dyno time.
Full details of Red Bull’s long-term plan, including the possible involvement of the Volkswagen Group, have yet to be confirmed.