Williams sells stake in team

[John S]

Well after The Merc buyout and Jens signing to Macca I thought things would go quiet for a while, and then this totally out of character news from Williams.   F1 sure is in a state of flux.

By Jonathan Noble Today, Autosport.com

Frank Williams and Patrick Head have sold an equity stake in their Formula 1 team to an Austrian investment company.

Williams and Head have been the sole co-owners of Williams since it was formed in 1977 - and there has long been resistance to selling off a part of the company despite frequent speculation linking the team with numerous manufacturers.

However, Williams announced on Friday that a deal has been reached with an Austrian investment company led by investor Toto Wolff for him to have shares in the team. He will also sit on the company's board.

As well as his business activities, Wolff is a part-time racer – having competed in recent years in the FIA GT championship and the Austrian Rally Championship – in which he finished runner-up last year.

Frank Williams is expected to speak later today about the motivation behind the selling of shares.

[FW14B]

This is most out of character, especially given how resistant he was to the BMW potential buy in a few years back.  Really weird, looking forward to his reasons for this.  Is this the beginning of the dilution of my team?   

[FW14B]

Looking at Wiki, Toto Wolff seems a guy who is a keen racer indeed, even his girlfriend is a racer!

Toto Wolff
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Christian 'Toto' Wolff [1] (* January 12, 1972 in Vienna, Austria) is an Austrian investor and racing driver.

Motorsport

Toto Wolff started his motorsports-career 1992 in Austrian Formula Ford Championship. He was driving in Austrian and German Formula Ford during 1993 and 1994. 1994 he won the 24 Hours Nürburgring in his category. In 2002 Wolff finished sixth place at the FIA NGT world championship and won one race. In 2003 he won a race of the FIA GT/GT1 series in Italy. 2004 Toto Wolff was racing together with Karl Wendlinger at the FIA GT[2] Championship series. Toto Wolff became Vice-Champion at the Austrian Rally Championship in 2006 and Winner of the 24-hours-race in Dubai [3]. Wolff holds the current lap record on the famous Nürburgring Nordschleife with a time of 7min 03sec achieved in a Porsche 997 RSR in April 2009.

Investor

Wolff founded Marchfifteen in 1998 and Marchsixteen Investments in 2004. The initial investments focused on internet and technology companies. Since 2003 Wolff has been concentrating on strategic investments in medium-sized industrial enterprises and stock exchange listed companies. The investments contained amongst other the german HWA AG, in which Wolff is member of the board as well as the BRR Rallye Racing, which has specialized in selling rally-parts throughout Europe. Wolff is co-owner of a management company with Mika Häkkinen and was involved in the management of upcoming racing drivers such as Alexandre Premat and Valtteri Bottas.

Formula One

On Friday November 20th 2009, it was announced that Wolff had bought a share of the Williams Formula One Team. [4]

Private life

At the moment Toto Wolff lives with his girlfriend, the Scottish racer Susie Stoddart at Lake Constance in Switzerland.

[cosworth151]

I think it's just that the team needs money - now.

[John S]

This is the latest about the sale of the Williams stake, taken from a Q & A session with Autosport.

Why choose now to sell a stake in the team?

Frank Williams: I'm 67, I'm not going to live forever. I want to take care of one or two private needs. I've never taken a penny out of the business in 40 years and time is getting on a bit. Most emphatically, I have no intention of stopping my involvement in this company or of ceasing my Formula 1 activities.

Have you sold more equity in the company than Patrick Head, or is it an even split?

FW: The shareholding is of a certain ratio and the sale more or less follows that. I don't want to go into too many details because our new partner is a fairly conservative-minded businessman. I would also emphasise that we've sold a minority shareholding in the true sense of the word.

Can you clarify how much this will leave you with in terms of your involvement in the team?

FW: Nothing changes. Adam Parr, as our CEO, runs the business on a day-to-day basis. I have a keen interest in the sponsorships of the team and work fairly extensively on that with all the other guys here. Patrick is still very involved, comes in every day. Adam comes in every day, and I come in every day. We've all just got to get on with our party. I've done it for a long time and I have no reason at this time in my life to want to stop doing that.

Is it simply a change in ownership, or is it going to have a net capital boost for Williams to the degree that it can change the team's status?

FW: It's entirely for private motives. I've never taken a penny out in many decades and Patrick and I decided that it's time to take care of some other needs and pay a few bills - my mortgage, for example.

[FW14B]

Definitely a 'politician's' answer there.  I hope the sponsor stuff comes true, we could certainly do with some new brands given the RBS pull out. 

[Jericoke]

So we're up to three Austrian teams now?

Frank's answers seem reasonable to me.  Ron Dennis has stepped away from McLaren F1.  Jean Todt is with the FIA.  Max is gone.  The old guard is giving way.  It's nice to see a racer taking on a team, rather than 'some rich guy'.

[FW14B]

Wolff says he has been 10%-49% of the team now, so I guess Williams is still 'British' right now, which is a good thing (for me, as a fan).  I like it that he seems to be a guy who is a racer, and I am enjoying the speculation that because he is involved in HWA and thus Mercedes, that Williams want to either develop their own engines or become a Mercedes customer from 2011.

[Scott]

I'm amazed to hear Frank has a mortgage.  I hope it goes well.  Austrians and British get along fairly well on the grid so far, so no reason to think this new relationship can't. 

Of course now Frank doesn't just have to answer to Patrick when he stands alone, but to Toto as well.