Formula 1 has set a budget limit of 175 million for 2021. An amount that has been discussed for years. Now that the corona crisis is endangering the survival of the smaller F1 teams, the possibility of reducing this limit even further is being discussed (among others by Zak Brown of McLaren).
For Mercedes, Red Bull Racing and Ferrari in particular, reducing this budget to, say, 100 million euros would have enormous consequences. In just over a year, they would be left with less than a quarter of their annual budget, making it almost inevitable that many employees would be out on the streets.
Mattia Binotto, in an interview with Sky Sports, therefore urges them not to react too emotionally to the crisis now and to implement such draconian measures. He stresses that he is well aware of the difficult position that the small teams are in, but also says that it is not self-evident for his team to spend less.
It is important to agree on different team situations
"We are discussing a budget-cap reduction but we should not forget in doing that exercise that we've got different structures, and different assets. There are teams which are constructors like Ferrari and other top teams where we are designing, developing, homologating and producing each single component of our cars."
"Other teams are customers, buying some parts, and do not have the same structures. So when discussing a budget cap we must not forget we have different situations, and it's important we found a common ground which is suited to the different situations and maybe the answer is not a single budget cap equal for all the teams."