Mercedes intends to reduce the number of Formula 1 teams to which it supplies power units, according to CEO and co-owner Toto Wolff.<\/p>\n
Besides Mercedes\u2019 works F1 team, its power units were also used by world championship McLaren plus Williams and Aston Martin this year. Aston Martin will switch to using Honda power units next season and Alpine will take up its supply of Mercedes engines.<\/p>\n
All three of Mercedes\u2019 customer teams have deals to use their engines until 2030. However Wolff says he and Mercedes chairman Ola Kallenius have discussed scaling back the number of teams which use its power units after Formula 1 introduces its new engine formula next year.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur current mindset is, also discussing with Ola, that we will reduce the amount of teams we\u2019re going to supply in the next cycle,\u201d he told the official Formula 1 channel<\/a>. He said the optimum number of teams is likely to be \u201cbetween two and three, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt depends on new regulations going forward,\u201d said Wolff. \u201cAre they rather simple or not? What is it we believe we can learn by supplying more [teams] whilst at the same time needing to lock in some designs earlier?\u201d<\/p>\n Supplying a total of four teams means Mercedes will have to bring a total of 16 power units to the first race of next season.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re Honda on your own [it will be] four or five. So that means longer lead times, longer production cycles.<\/p>\n Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cSo [considering] all of that, going forward, it\u2019s not going to be four anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n Mercedes produced by far the most successful power units of the V6 hybrid turbo era, which ended this year. Their engines powered McLaren to victory in the constructors\u2019 championship for the second season in a row this year, while Mercedes won eight in a row from 2014 to 2021.<\/p>\n Hywel Thomas, the managing director of Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains, said there are benefits and downsides to supplying multiple F1 teams.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve shown in the past that having more than one team [means] you\u2019re getting more data, you\u2019re getting more information, you\u2019re [covering] more kilometres,\u201d he said. \u201cJust because you\u2019ve got all those cars. You\u2019ve got four times the engineers all sitting around telling you \u2018no, you can do this better, you can do this more this way\u2019, and that is very, very beneficial to have all that coming at you. It doesn\u2019t always feel like it, but it definitely is in terms of making a great product.<\/p>\n \u201cBut the flip of that is we\u2019ve got to make a lot of hardware. We\u2019ve got to, you know, and we have got to make a few decisions earlier. I\u2019m not sure making those decisions earlier really hurts you sometimes because you can run things a bit too close to the wind, I think. That is the flip.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not even sure whether the right place is one team, two teams, three teams, four teams. I\u2019m not sure. There\u2019s definitely a sweet spot in there somewhere and I think it\u2019s probably nearer four than one.\u201d<\/p>\n Advert | Become a RaceFans supporter and go ad-free<\/a><\/p>\n