NOVEMBER 28, 2001

The birth of GPWC Holding BV

GPWC is the company that intends to start its own World Championship in 2007 and one can only guess that the name stands for Grand Prix World Championship.

GPWC is the company that intends to start its own World Championship in 2007 and one can only guess that the name stands for Grand Prix World Championship. The new company has been set up in Holland with Fiat's Paolo Cantarella named as the chairman.

BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Fiat, Ford and Renault are all involved in the new series. A press release put out by the companies said that the new series aims to "improve in a substantial way the financial benefits of the participating teams and to guarantee absolute economic transparency".

The board of directors of the new company includes Cantarella, Patrick Faure of Renault, Burkhard Goeschel (BMW), Jurgen Hubbert (DaimlerChrysler) and Wolfgang Reitzle (Ford).

The car makers have already had meetings with non-aligned teams and asked them to join the planned new World Championship.

While it is possible that the new series could go ahead it is more likely that the foundation of GPWC is a means on putting pressure on Kirch to agree to new terms which give the participants in Formula One more money.