Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff has expressed the view that Formula 1 is greatly indebted to Red Bull, despite the current debate regarding its dual-team ownership.
Recent times have seen growing concerns over the strengthened relationship between Red Bull and its affiliate team VCARB, with McLaren’s CEO Zak Brown openly criticizing the partnership.
Zak Brown has advocated for amendments to the regulatory framework to promote greater autonomy among teams, noting that VCARB is utilizing the maximum number of components permissible under the regulations from Red Bull.
In response to inquiries about the issue, Wolff pointed out Red Bull’s significant contribution to F1, notably through its investment in a second team.
“I think there is a legacy situation with Red Bull that the sport owes them a lot,” Wolff told RacingNews365.
“They have two teams, they finance them. They have a great junior program, a track and lots of brand value, and so they’re not like any other smaller team.
“So I think on the shareholder level, it’s quite a difficult discussion based on that contribution.”
Wolff highlighted the need for a review of the regulations but warned against the implications of completely prohibiting collaborations in the future.
“We are a constructor sport, and I believe the same shareholding, same location, share of facilities, it’s clear that some ambiguity is always going be left with competitors,” he said.
“What we need to look at is the regulations – are the regulations robust enough? Are they policed well enough for us to be in a safe place or are we seeing some potential loopholes and what is it we need for 2026?
“That is the main question – define regulations that make everyone comfortable with the situation from the small teams that use such collaboration like Haas, it’s going to be very difficult for them to stand on their own feet, to the teams that have no relationships to the big teams, all the way on the other end that have joined shareholding and same locations.
“I believe that is the thing we need to be tackling, that everybody is fine with the situation.”
