Fuel

Repsol SA

The death of General Franco in 1975 the Spain into modern world but until 1981 there was political instability which resulted in a coup d'etat. When that collapsed Calvo Sotelo was prime minister named Prime Minister and reform began. In the oil industry the government created the Instituto Nacional de Hidrocarburos (INH) which took control of all of Spain's oil resources. The following year Sotelo resigned and socialist Felipe Gonzalez took power and in 1986 that Repsol was created as a state enterprise. Three years later the firm was partially privatized although the government remained in control of the business. Jose Maria Aznar became Prime Minister in 1996 and the full flotation of Repsol was completed in 1997.At the end of that year Repsol representatives visited several Formula 1 teams hoping to negotiate a deal for Formula Nippon Champion Pedro de la Rosa to break into F1. Repsol had previously been involved in rallying, supporting Carlos Sainz and in the 500cc World Motorcycling Championship with Mick Doohan and Alex Criville.In 1998 Repsol signed a deal with Jordan for de la Rosa to become the team's test driver but in 1999 switched to Arrows and de la Rosa became a full-time F1 driver as team mate to Mika Salo. The aim of the program was to increase awareness of Repsol's activities in South America in the wake of the company's $13.44bn takeover of Argentina's YPF oil company.Repsol remained with Arrows in 2000 but when de la Rosa was dropped unexpectedly at the start of 2001 the company withdrew from F1.