Red Bull confirms Minardi takeover

RED BULL TAKES OVER MINARDI
"three birds with one stone"

Today, at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit, an agreement was reached whereby, from 1st November 2005, Austria's Red Bull GmbH will take over all the company shares of the Minardi Formula 1 team and will be responsible for running the team. Red Bull will therefore run two Formula 1 teams from the start of the 2006 season onwards.

The second team will be positioned as a "Rookie Team" and this and the current Red Bull Racing will operate independently of one another and compete against one another on the track.

The main reasons for Red Bull deciding to enter a second team starting in the 2006 Formula 1 World Championship are:

1. Red Bull has more talented drivers than it has available cockpits. This meant there were only two ways of helping up-coming drivers: either place them in other teams or to increase the number of cockpits available to us. After much careful thought, Red Bull decided to go with the second of these options.

2. Looking at the current state of Formula 1 we feel that the second team will be able to maintain its current assets while also being able to generate its own income in the future, in order to become almost self-financing.

3. This acquisition also means that Red Bull now has a second vote in any matters raised regarding the future of Formula 1.

At the moment, no decisions have been taken as regards the name of the team, its management nor its drivers.

-redbull-