Fresh blow to F1 TV coverage

The promise of dramatically improved terrestrial TV coverage of Formula 1 next season has suffered a setback after Bernie Ecclestone failed in his bid to secure the host broadcasting rights for next year's races

Dec 12, 2002, 11:23 AM

After the collapse of his digital TV project, Ecclestone turned his attention to improving the quality of the 'free-to-air' transmissions. A key element in this was taking control away from local television directors, who have been criticised in the past for concentrating too much on local drivers.

Ecclestone's failure to secure the rights has had the knock-on effect of mass redundancies at his Formula One Management operation, which is based at Biggin Hill. More than 300 staff have been put on paid leave, and it is thought that around 70 percent of these will be made redundant.

It remains to be seen what impact the redundancies will have on plans to introduce features from the digital 'supersignal' such as on-board cameras and greater angles into the terrestrial feed stations such as ITV receive.