“The livery, I hope it’s a bit different,” said Max Verstappen, speaking on Red Bull’s in-house ‘Talking Bull’ podcast. Max Verstappen clinched his fourth Formula One driver’s championship in 2024, solidifying his name in the circle of racing legends. But as Sergio Perez failed to keep up with him – finishing 285 points behind Verstappen – his team let go of him. However, the 2024 Champion might get his livery wish granted as one sponsor seems to have been let go as well.

Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange Bybit has been on Red Bull’s sponsorship bandwagon since 2022. Bringing a three-year, $150 Million contract to the table, their contribution was massive – but that will cease before the 2025 season starts.

No sign of Red Bull renewing sponsorship deal

Well, the official announcement has not hit the blocks yet but when Red Bull signed a multi-year partnership with Bybit in February 2022, they envisioned big goals. It was described as the largest-ever annual crypto sponsorship in international sports. Bybit became the “principal team partner” of Red Bull and aimed to distribute its growing collection of digital assets and issue fan tokens. These tokens are a type of cryptocurrency that helps boost fan engagement, allowing them to have a say on team decisions like kit designs. However, these grand goals fizzled out as scrutiny about cryptocurrency exchanges was on the rise.

Now Red Bull also appears to have lost faith in its partner. The championship-winning Formula One team’s website drops a glaring hint to support that claim. The team’s extensive list of partners includes names like Armor All, Athletic Propulsion Labs, AvaTrade, Heineken, Pepe Jeans, and so many more. However, Bybit’s name is no longer visible.

An F1 fan pointed this out on Reddit: “[Breaking] Oracle Red Bull Racing has removed Bybit from there team partners page. They were the biggest sponsor in F1 paying 150M$ a year to the team.” However, it is also worth noting that Red Bull’s contract with Bybit ended its three years in 2024, therefore this seems like a calculated decision from Red Bull not to renew their deal.

This removal is only the latest update in the team’s massive overhaul. Sergio Perez cost Red Bull a bid for the constructor’s championship at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. His lack of wins on top of that created a dire prospect for him, and in mid-December, his team parted ways. Liam Lawson got the nod to be his replacement for 2025. The New Zealander made two super-sub stints with Red Bull’s sister team – when he replaced an injured Daniel Ricciardo at the end of 2023 and again did the same for the United States Grand Prix onwards in 2024. Besides this, team principal and design genius Adrian Newey will move to Aston Martin while sporting director Jonathan Wheatley will join Audi.

Despite these massive overhauls, the team itself has an optimistic outlook for 2025.

The team champ is feeling buoyant

Well, Max Verstappen was not very high-spirited when he heard about his teammate’s departure. He acknowledged the immense contribution that Sergio Perez made to Red Bull, despite his struggles in 2024. However, the 4-time champion is feeling good about one change. Every six months, F1 teams are measured on their championship progress. Accordingly, they earn the time to test in wind tunnels. During the 2024 season, as the reigning world champion, Red Bull had the least wind tunnel time of all the teams. For the constructor’s championship, the team lost first to McLaren, and then even Ferrari edged past them.

Although it missed out on a hefty sum of money, Red Bull has an added advantage for 2025. From 1st January onwards, it will get more time in the wind tunnel as well as more CFD simulations. The team could make good use of the extra time to improve their 2024 struggles and also develop the RB21. Max Verstappen himself hailed this update as a positive one despite losing the constructor’s title. “We have, I guess, a positive. We won the drivers’, didn’t win the constructors’, so we gained a bit of wind tunnel time, in a way, maybe that’s positive,” he said at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Evidently, Red Bull is looking forward to a revamped season. As 2025 has kicked off, we expect some thumping good performances from the team.