Formula One chief executive Bernie Ecclestone has said he is considering making a bid to retake control of the commercial rights to the motor-racing series.
Ecclestone said he has held talks with CVC Capital Partners co-chairman Donald Mackenzie over the private equity group’s main shareholding in the sport. CVC is the largest shareholder in Formula One with a stake of around 35 per cent, while 83-year-old Ecclestone currently holds a five per cent interest in the sport.
“I have spoken to Donald Mackenzie and I am looking at it,” Ecclestone told UK newspaper the Daily Express. “It is possible, although one or two other companies are interested and I would not enter an auction. Age does not makes it impossible. I feel no different to how I did 40 years ago.
“Our company has been a very good investment for CVC and it would be a very good investment for me or anyone who owned it. You can make money from it, so it would not be a problem for me to find financial backers. I run it now but it wouldn't make any difference it just means I would have to buy the shares. I think the company is a good solid business and a good investment.”
CVC cut its F1 interest from around 63 per cent to approximately 35 per cent in 2012 through two separate deals. In June 2012, Waddell & Reed increased its stake in the business from around 14.4 per cent to 20.9 per cent in a $500m (€365m) deal. The agreement with the American asset management company was announced after CVC sold a 21 per cent stake in the company for $1.6bn in May 2012 ahead of its mooted initial public offering (IPO) on the Singapore Stock Exchange. That deal also involved Waddell & Reed, along with global investment manager BlackRock and Norway's Norges Bank.
Efforts to float Formula One have stalled of late and Ecclestone said he would seek to change the running of the company if he gained control. He said: “The last couple of years we have been running the business as if CVC were going to float the company. So we have run like a public company, which has limitations.
“If I bought it I wouldn't think of that. I have always been used to doing things on the spot and with a public company it is always about board decisions. It can be restrictive, although I must say that CVC have been super, they don't tell me how to run it. They have been super-supportive, with all my troubles.”
Ecclestone’s reference to his “troubles” relate to his ongoing trial in Germany, where he is accused of bribery over the sale of the shares in the CVC deal, which saw BayernLB sell a 47-per-cent stake in Formula One to CVC for about $830m in 2005.
source: Sportbusiness
