JULY 1, 2003

No electronic records at Vodafone

The Commercial Court in London yesterday saw David Haines, the global branding director of Vodafone and the man at the center of the Jordan-Vodafone case, saying that he did not have any records of e-mails from the period in which Jordan and Vodafone were negotiating.

Haines said that he routinely deleted all his electronic correspondence and that there is nothing left from between January and March 2001 when the talks with Jordan and other teams were taking place. One of the e-mails that he received during this period related to the Jordan deal and laid out terms which Vodafone wanted from its F1 sponsorship, including the right to name the team Team Vodafone Jordan. This was sent to the five teams involved in the negotiations. Jordan claims to be the only team which could have offered such a deal, although at the time there is nothing to suggest that Toyota had a deal with Panasonic. This was not announced until July that year.

The case continues.