FEBRUARY 4, 2005

Manufacturers to meet again on Wednesday

The Formula 1 manufacturers, with the exception of Ferrari, will meet again next Wednesday to move forward from their position from the recent meeting at which they unanimously agreed on a set of "governing principles" which they believe represent an appropriate framework for the sport in the future. The next step will be to come up with the framework of what they believe the rules of F1 should be. The manufacturers are expected to remind the FIA that under the terms of the Concorde Agreement the federation cannot simply dream up whatever it likes for the 2008 season and has to consult with the Formula 1 Commission to establish the future shape of the sport. The next meeting after that will be on February 16 when the team principals sit down with the iSe organization and hear the detailed plans which that organization has for the financing of a future World Championship.

At the moment it it reckoned that the teams get 23% of the revenues generated in F1. This means that the promoters take away 77% of the money. The International Olympic Committee in comparison keeps only 8% of its marketing revenues, the rest being distributed to the different national Olympic Committees to pay for sending the athletes to the games and into training and development schemes in the individual countries. FIFA and UEFA in soccer work on a margin of around 18% with 52% going on events and contributions to the teams and 25% on development schemes for the sport. In the British Premier League the teams take away between 80 and 90% of the money raised.

Other sports are more complicated but there are some which take advantage of the players. The Association of Tennis Professionals, a players' union, went into partnership in 1990 with the majority of the major tournaments to create the ATP Tour. The individual competitions pay difference percentages of their income in prize money. The smaller tournaments have to offer more to attact big names and give away as much as 50% of their revenues in prize money but other better known competitions have prize money of less than 9%. However, these have revenues of up to $100m a year and so a prize fund of $9m means that professional tennis players, who do not have massive expenses, make a huge amount of money.