RB CEO Peter Bayer revealed to Motorsport Week that parent company Red Bull considered downsizing to one Formula 1 outfit prior to the 2024 campaign.
The Faenza-operated RB team, known in full as Visa Cash App RB, is the product of an offseason rebrand for the Red Bull ‘sister’ outfit.
RB follows two previous iterations of the Red Bull-owned Faneza squad, which was known as Toro Rosso from 2006 to 2019 and Alpha Tauri from 2020 to 2023.
Before Red Bull set out its mission to rebrand RB with new commercial partners and the objective of winning the F1 midfield war, Bayer spoke of plans to offload the team altogether.
“[Red Bull] set a strategy, because I think it was no secret that they were discussing at least whether we should keep both teams actually, or should we just focus on one team, and then run our F1 operations through Red Bull Racing,” Bayer told Motorsport Week.
“But very quickly they came to a conclusion that ‘no, we want to keep both teams,’ there are a lot of positives.”
READ MORE: Exclusive: RB ready for Yuki Tsunoda to be F1 team leader amid Daniel Ricciardo exit
Exploring synergy with two F1 teams
RB Team Principal Laurent Mekies added that Red Bull was “certainly looking at the best possible way to use a second [F1] team.
“They felt that they needed a new start in terms of how the team was positioned, both from pure identity perspectives and also from a competitiveness point of view.
“What they told us is that ‘we have a lot of great ideas on what we want to do about this second team, but the first thing is P8, P9, P10 doesn’t work,’ because whatever our message is, if we are at the back of the grid we are going to struggle to get that message to complement anything that we are not already doing with the team [Red Bull] winning every race.
“The second thing they told us is, ‘there are very, very clear regulations, can we please have a look at it and think about the two teams as being owned by one entity, you are competing one against the other, but at least where regulations allow, can we have a look at if it makes sense to do everything that the regulations are allowing us to do’, which was not always the case before.”
Zak Brown questions Red Bull F1 ownership structure
The fact that Red Bull owns two F1 teams, 20% of the grid, has been the cause of conflict with some of its rivals.
McLaren CEO Zak Brown has long been a voice against Red Bull’s F1 ownership structure, saying it goes against the spirit of fairness and competitiveness in the series.
“I’m much more interested in the independence of the 10 teams than the actual co-ownership itself,” Brown said ahead of the 2024 campaign.
Brown’s concerns reignited following Daniel Ricciardo’s pitting at the end of the Singapore Grand Prix to go on a successful fastest-lap run, wrestling a point away from Lando Norris.
The McLaren CEO argued that was a ploy by Red Bull to help Max Verstappen in his title fight with Norris.
“That’s a nice A/B team sporting thing that I didn’t think was allowed,” Brown told SiriusXM.
that’s not the first time we’ve seen it, probably won’t be the last.
“I’ll certainly ask some questions. It’s something I’ve spoken about in the past and I think it illustrates that it does happen, because I think you wouldn’t have made that pit stop to go for that.
“It’s not going to get anyone a point, so I think it does illustrate the issue around that topic.”
READ MORE: McLaren F1 aggrieved by Red Bull fastest lap ploy in Singapore
