Andretti’s $200 Million Fear Comes to Fruition as F1 Teams Set an “Agenda” With the FIA: “It’s an Investment”

F1, along with its owner Liberty Media, has now come to a crossroads with the FIA and Andretti over Andretti’s F1 ambitions. The American giant, which has been willing to pay $200 million in anti-dilution fees as per the Concorde Agreement, has faced huge resistance from the grid. But after an exchange of comments back and forth, things might get going once again, as a key topic of discussion has been tabled for the FIA’s F1 Commission meeting next week. McLaren CEO Zak Brown revealed the news of the addition of new teams to the agenda.

The meeting will discuss the possibility of increasing the anti-dilution fee, which many team bosses, including Red Bull’s Christian Horner and Mercedes’ Toto Wolff, have argued isn’t sufficient. Moreover, Horner also cited logistics as an issue, which appears to back up his opposition to an eleventh team, an idea to which eight teams are opposed. 

Race Fans quoted Zak Brown,saying, “I’ve not really spoken with other teams about it [but] it will be a topic at this upcoming FIA commission meeting. We’ve been sent the agenda and new teams is a topic.”

Hinting at his possible support for an increased fee, he added, “And it’s good value for money, right? I mean, these franchises are worth quite a bit of money. So it’s an investment as opposed to a fee because these franchises, if not already worth billions, certainly will be in the not-too-distant future like other major sports.”

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The teams argue that the value they have brought to Formula One is much more than just money and that they deserve to be compensated fairly. Moreover, they claim that the sport’s value has increased manifolds in recent years, so its fee should be more in line with other major competitions.

McLaren backs Andretti’s addition as 11th team

McLaren and Alpine are said to be the only teams backing Andretti’s move. But Christian Horner alleges that’s only because of their personal benefit or interest in the deal. However, Zak Brown provides his own different reasoning.

“And so as long as a new team is additive, helps us get better TV deals, brings awareness that drives more sponsorship, and pays an appropriate franchise entry fee that’s in line with what the value of what F1 is today,” Zak said, claiming to want to help the sport grow rather than have it big for himself.

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The wheel might officially get going after the meeting if some concrete plan comes up. Until then, we can only expect Formula 1 to not budge against the FIA’s demands.