Mohammed Ben Sulayem has said that Andretti Global is the only new team to have expressed interest to the FIA in a potential entry
F1 and FIA disagreements
Earlier this month the FIA announced that they would be opening an expression of interest for new teams, with Andretti and General Motors declaring that they were launching an F1 entry bid under the Cadillac name.
This was met with a ‘lukewarm’ reaction from F1 and its teams, with F1 putting out a statement saying: “There is great interest in the F1 project at this time with a number of conversations continuing that are not as visible as others.
“We all want to ensure the Championship remains credible and stable and any new entrant will be assessed on criteria to meet those objectives by all the relevant stakeholders.
“Any new entrant request requires the agreement of both F1 and the FIA.”
Most of the teams were also said not to be particularly happy with the news. Adding an 11th team would dilute their current commercial rights income, as they believe the current $200m anti- dilution fund that any new entrant must pay is not enough considering the sports growth over the past couple of years.
This led Ben Sulayem to put a statement on Twitter saying that he was ‘surprised’ by the ‘adverse reaction’ to the Andretti Cadillac entry bid.
However, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said that the partnership was certainly a “statement” and McLaren CEO Zak Brown said that Andretti has “put forward a very compelling proposition.”
Ben Sulayem still backs entry
In an interview with Motorsport.com at the Rallye Monte Carlo Mohammed Ben Sulayem said that he revealed he had a “good meeting” with the president of General Motors, Mark Reuss, and questioned how such a name could be denied a place on the grid.
“How can we say no to a big manufacturer?
“We talk about the United States, we have three races there, it’s very healthy.
“But I am elected not to make money, I’m elected to sustain motorsport, clearly.”
He added: “They might say, ‘oh it’s taking our piece of the cake.’ Yes, to them – but what do you want? Maybe kick (out) five teams, and then you have more money? You can take it both ways.
“I want them to succeed, but to get more money and less money…… I mean the cost cap was effective, and we’re trying to make it more effective, imagine you are having 145 million on everyone.
“But I cannot block a manufacturer. Me doing that, it’s wrong.”
The FIA president has also recently come under fire for his comments about the sports ‘inflated’ $20billion valuation which landed him receiving a stern letter from F1 management accusing him of interfering with the commercial rights.
F1 and the FIA are currently at odds with one another and a rift between the two has appeared to have formed over recent weeks.