Brawn says F1 won’t scrap Haas model

Formula 1 will not get rid of the business model that allowed Haas to enter the sport, in order to attract more new teams in the future.

Discussions have been taking place over the past 12 months regarding the future direction of F1, with new commercial agreements needed in 2021, as well as a change to the regulations being planned. The Haas business model has come under criticism from established constructors such as Williams and McLaren, but F1’s managing director of motorsports Ross Brawn says there won’t be any significant changes in order to expand the grid.

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“The Haas model is interesting,” Brawn told Sky Sports. “It has been very successful and it’s something we have to maintain for the future -- for it to be possible for a small team to be able to come in and be pretty respectable. There is some trimming we need to do to what they have been able to do. I don’t see a big change in the Haas model.

“But we need to make sure we remove the doubt some teams have about their cooperation with the big team, which is Ferrari. We need to make sure it’s well defined and everyone knows what you can and can’t do. There are gray areas we need clarity on. Haas is a good model, we don’t want to spoil it, but we want to make sure of its place in F1.”

While Haas is competitive in part due to its decision to purchase a number of parts from Ferrari -- as allowed by the current regulations -- the top three teams still enjoy a significant advantage over the rest of the field. A planned budget cap has the intention of bringing the grid closer together, but Brawn says there are other areas costs can be reduced by making items spec.

“For example, we want every team to have the same pit equipment. There is a lot of stuff we have common ground on. There is some stuff we all agree shouldn’t change and there’s stuff in the middle being argued about. Everyone makes their own fire extinguishers. It’s a nice technical challenge, but it doesn’t add performance. We can standardize those and help reduce the costs.”