Red Bull GmbH has confirmed Helmut Marko will leave the team at the end of the F1 2025 season, ending a tenure of over 20 years.

After over two decades involved in the operations of Red Bull’s F1 teams, the parent company has confirmed Helmut Marko will leave at the end of 2025.

Helmut Marko: Now is the right moment to go

With speculation swirling since the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix weekend about Marko’s future, Red Bull GmbH, the parent company of the Red Bull Racing team, has released a short statement confirming the Austrian’s departure from the organisation.

With more than 20 years of tenure working with Red Bull, the statement says that Marko has made a personal decision to step away from his role, where he has served in an official capacity as a senior advisor to the F1 operations on behalf of Red Bull GmbH.

“I have been involved in motorsport for six decades now, and the past 20-plus years at Red Bull have been an extraordinary and extremely successful journey,” Marko said.

“It has been a wonderful time that I have been able to help shape and share with so many talented people. Everything we have built and achieved together fills me with pride.

“Narrowly missing out on the world championship this season has moved me deeply and made it clear to me that now is the right moment for me personally to end this very long, intense, and successful chapter.

“I wish the entire team continued success and am convinced that they will be fighting for both world championship titles again next year.“

Speaking to the media, including PlanetF1.com, after the disappointment of Max Verstappen’s title defeat to Lando Norris in Abu Dhabi, Marko had explained that he would need to “sleep on it” when considering what his future with Red Bull might look like.

Marko still had one year left on his contract with the company, while he also served as a director of the Red Bull Racing team.

However, it’s understood that tensions between Marko and the new power structure of GmbH CEO Oliver Mintzlaff and newly-appointed F1 team principal Laurent Mekies had escalated during the second half of this season due to various factors.

The 82-year-old has been the last remaining piece of the former long-standing power structure at Red Bull Racing, with the Austrian serving as the ‘man on the ground’ for the company’s late founder, Dietrich Mateschitz, when Red Bull first entered Formula 1 in 2005.

Marko, together with former team boss Christian Horner, formed a formidable partnership, with the team becoming one of the most competitive of the past two decades as the Milton Keynes-based squad emerged first as championship contenders in 2009 and, shortly after, multiple title winners.

But, in the wake of Mateschitz’s death in 2022 and the transfer of shares to his son Mark, who appointed Mintzlaff to the role of CEO as one of a three-man board at Red Bull, a power struggle began to emerge within the F1 team under Horner’s leadership.

This eventually ended in the bombshell axing of Horner from his roles as team boss and CEO of Red Bull Racing during the summer of 2025, as well as his being removed as a director of the various companies under Red Bull’s F1 umbrella. He was succeeded in all of these roles by Mekies, with Mintzlaff turning to the French engineer after Mekies held down the team boss role at Racing Bulls from the start of 2024.

With Marko having seemingly come through the transitional period unscathed, it appears that tensions between the Austrian and the new power structure of Mintzlaff and Mekies have escalated through various incidents.

As a representative of Red Bull GmbH and not Red Bull Racing, Marko has become infamous for speaking to the media as he pleases, often without any oversight from the team, and his revealing of more sensitive information on a regular basis is believed to have been a growing strike against him.

This was behaviour largely tolerated while working with Horner, who was willing to give Marko greater freedom in this regard.

As reported by PlanetF1.com on Monday, former McLaren junior Alex Dunne reached an advanced stage of negotiations with Marko, with a deal signed to bring the 20-year-old Irishman into the fold of the Red Bull programme. This was done entirely by Marko, acting alone, with no input from Mekies and Mintzlaff.

Upon the discovery of the contract with Dunne, Marko’s unilateral decision-making is said to have been a further strike against him, particularly in the eyes of Mintzlaff, who has set out to bring control of Red Bull’s F1 operations entirely back under the GmbH umbrella and his leadership.

The ordered termination of the deal is said to have triggered a penalty clause in the contract, meaning Dunne is set to receive a termination fee said to be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. If the sum is this large, Red Bull’s payment is likely to be going some way towards Dunne’s F2 campaign with Rodin in 2026, as well as compensating for the exit payment shelled out to McLaren to leave the Woking-based team’s development programme.

The ice under Marko is said to have melted further at the Singapore Grand Prix, with the head of the Thai shareholding in Red Bull, Chalerm Yoovidhya, understood to have become upset with aspects of Marko’s behaviour in the paddock.

The final straw is linked to Marko’s comments made after the Qatar Grand Prix, in which he insinuated on live television that 18-year-old Kimi Antonelli had intentionally let title hopeful Lando Norris through to take a position from him on the penultimate lap of the race.

Antonelli had already started to receive significant social media abuse in the immediate aftermath, with this toxicity further fuelled by Marko’s comments.

The incident is said to have incensed Mekies to the point where he’s believed to have been personally involved in the apology statement issued by the team afterwards.

But, according to the statement issued by GmbH on Tuesday, the decision to step back and away from F1 was one Marko came to of his own accord.

More on F1 2025

👉 The results of the F1 2025 championship

👉 The updated Drivers’ and Constructors’ Championship standings

Oliver Mintzlaff ‘deeply regets’ Helmut Marko decision

“Helmut approached me with the wish to end his role as motorsport advisor at the end of the year,” said Mintzlaff.

“I deeply regret his decision, as he has been an influential figure for more than two decades, and his departure marks the end of an extraordinary era.

“Over more than 20 years, Helmut has earned incomparable merits for our team and the entire Red Bull motorsport family. He played a decisive role in all key strategic decisions that made Red Bull Racing what it is today: a multiple world champion, an engine of innovation, and a cornerstone of international motorsport.

“His instinct for exceptional talent not only shaped our junior program but also left a lasting impact on Formula 1 as a whole. Names like Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen stand for the many drivers who were discovered, supported, and guided to the very top under his leadership. His passion, his courage to make clear decisions, and his ability to spot potential will remain unforgettable.

“After a long and intensive conversation, I knew I had to respect his wishes, as I gained the impression that the timing felt right for him to take this step. Even though his departure will leave a significant gap, our respect for his decision and our gratitude for everything he has done for Red Bull Racing outweigh it.

“Helmut Marko will be deeply missed—both personally and professionally. We wish him all the very best for the future and hope that he will remain closely and warmly connected to the team.”

Marko has been a divisive character amongst F1 fans, but his ability for talent-spotting in the junior categories has brought some heavy-hitters to the grid during his time with Red Bull.

He oversaw the signing of both of Red Bull’s multiple F1 World Champions, Verstappen and Sebastian Vettel, while also bringing Daniel Ricciardo, Alex Albon, Pierre Gasly, Carlos Sainz, and Sebastien Buemi into Formula 1.

As part of the management structure of Red Bull, Marko has aided in the securing of eight Drivers’ Championships and six Constructors’ Championships.

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