Big change of plans! The Honda & Red Bull collaboration will continue, for several reasons

Big change of plans! Honda will supply engines to not only Red Bull but also Alpha Tauri until 2025. There are, of course, several reasons, especially operational and political ones. Helmut Marko also gave his comments on the situation and also revealed a lot.

Honda formally ended its activities in Formula 1 at the end of last year, but it was clear to all involved that some sort of cooperation between the Japanese engine manufacturer and Red Bull would continue.

Essentially, however, this meant that if the official partnership ended, Red Bull would pay for Honda’s services. Indeed, the Japanese carmaker has expressed its plans for electrification, which it wants to concentrate on in future years.

So Red Bull representatives announced that they would go their own way and set up a new company called Red Bull Powetrains. The team would both manufacture and develop the powertrains, possibly with the help of one of the potential new partners (VW, Audi, Porsche).

An even better way to explain this situation is that Red Bull would build its own engines in the years to come (thanks to parts from Honda, of course) while working on a new project regarding the new F1 rules that will come into force in 2026.

However, Helmut Marko revealed in an interview with Motorsport that everything will actually be different in the end. Is this a big change? Undoubtedly yes, as Honda is to supply complete engines to Red Bull and Alpha Tauri until 2025!

With this move, Red Bull is almost admitting that the plans for the newly formed company were somewhat overconfident. Firstly, although the team has managed to bring in a large number of engineers and key people from Mercedes, they still don’t have the manpower to get production up and running reliably.

The decision also removes any concerns about issues such as quality control that might result from moving powertrain construction to the UK. At the same time, Red Bull Powertrains can better focus on their new project.

It should be noted, there will be a freeze on powertrain development this year. This will allow Honda to deliver an already improved power unit to Red Bull, even with the complex modifications required for the fuel changeover.

The change is also about Red Bull being seen as a manufacturer in 2026. Why? Due to the very likely introduction of budget caps, potential newcomer teams will have an advantage or some relief, mainly consisting of more funding.

It is not yet clear whether the engines will still be labelled “Honda engines”, although this would be a logical step due to many aspects, especially political ones.

“The engines will be produced in Japan until 2025, we will not touch them. This means that all the rights will remain with the Japanese, which is important for 2026 in the sense that it will make us newcomers,” Marko said in an interview with Autorevue magazine, quoted by Motorsport.

“There has been a reassessment of the whole situation between us and Honda, obviously in the sense that they could take advantage of our expertise in terms of batteries, given their involvement in the electrification project,” he explained.

“Originally, the plan was that they would only produce engines for us for 2022, but now it has been decided that they will supply us with engines until 2025, which is a huge advantage for us. It means we only have to make fine adjustments and calibrations,” he concluded.

F1, Motorsport