Is F1 heading towards a 'servant' team future?

The entire Formula 1 community and fans worldwide were in agreement last week that Force India being saved from collapse was a good thing (at least in the short term).

With so many jobs at risk at the 'Pink Panther' team, which has built up a fanbase as an exciting underdog, not having it on the grid would have been a terrible blow for F1.

But the immediate relief that a takeover by Lawrence Stroll's consortium has been achieved does not mean all is now rosy in the F1 garden. A few alarm bells have begun ringing about the potential implications of where things could head with the team longer term.

One of the fears that has been growing ever since it became clear that Force India was in financial trouble was that this was going to be another step towards a future F1 with 'servant' teams - so-called because these outfits end up working for manufacturers to help get around budget limits.

When it first emerged that Renault, McLaren and Williams were blocking the initial attempt for Force India to keep hold of its previous commercial rights income, some wrongly assumed that this was just a 'dog eat dog' response by those teams to try and get a cut of the money themselves.

But such a view could not have been further from the truth, because the real issue was that the trio wanted some guarantees that a saved Force India was not going to morph into a Mercedes B team, strengthening the hand of one of F1's two main manufacturers that some think already wield too much power.

In the end, the rebels backed down on the historical prize money issue in a bid to avoid putting Force India out of F1. But the worries about a manufacturer takeover have not been eased. Indeed, some comments floating around in Belgium last weekend have actually served to increase the concerns rather than ease them.

When asked about fears Force India could become a Mercedes B team in the future, the German manufacturer's motorsport boss Toto Wolff did little to suggest it wasn't going to happen by immediately invoking comparisons with the Ferrari/Haas relationship.

"Obviously a few years ago when Ferrari spotted the potential in collaborating closely with another team, it triggered a thought process with everybody else," Wolff said.

"And only Ferrari will know how much benefit they have generated, but there is benefit in such a cooperation if it is structured well.

When Haas first came on the scene, there was anxiety that Ferrari had gained from 'free' extra windtunnel tests

"No team wants to be a B team, no team wants to be a junior team. Everybody wants their own success, and this is something you need to honour and respect in F1.

"If you can meet on eye level, a collaboration makes sense. But making it happen is not trivial.

"All of us are structured, all of us have processes in place that make sense, and evaluating potential opportunities is something which we will clearly do. Force India is six or eight miles down the road from us, they are a team which punches above its weight class.

"The result [of Belgian Grand Prix qualifying] confirms my respect for them in terms of racers, and within the permissible regulations we will explore all avenues."

Take note of the emphasis on the 'benefits' that are being talked about for the manufacturers in forming an alliance with other outfits.

Teams have woken up to the fact that there are clear gains to be had through collaboration. If a team cannot spend more than a $150million limit, then the best way to find performance is to get another team to spend money on your behalf, doing the work you cannot do and then sharing the lessons with you free of charge.

Let's not forget that when Haas first came on the scene, there was a huge controversy over the fact it had not been bound by aerodynamic testing restrictions placed on competing teams. There was anxiety that Ferrari had gained from 'free' extra windtunnel tests.

While no evidence of collusion was found at the time, new rules were put in place to limit the sharing of information gained from aerodynamic testing, and to police the swift movements of staff to ensure personnel were not rotated in and out of other team projects to get around rules.

No rival working alone would be able to match the might of two teams working together

The fear now though is that when the budget cap forces manufacturers such as Mercedes and Ferrari to cut back on current staff levels, they will actually just deploy these personnel full-time to their partner teams - and get them to continue working for them through a back-door route of 'shared' parts exchanged between teams on a customer basis.

There was a theory going around that former Ferrari chief designer Simone Resta's swift switch to Sauber earlier this year to become its new technical director was all about this.

With the manufacturer teams getting a financial benefit from the customer teams, a 'servant' team operation would be all about helping to produce performance gains for the parent team so that their advantage at the front is even bigger.

No rival working alone would be able to match the might of two teams working together to fast track developments or come up with the best overall solution.

Do not doubt for a second that if the benefits of having a 'servant' team prove to be enough to a manufacturer, and can be done inside the regulations, then it will happen.

That could leave F1 divided into clear camps. There will be a Ferrari camp of a 'servant' Sauber team with Haas as a customer, and there will be a Mercedes camp of a 'servant' Force India with a customer Williams arrangement.

Then there will be the Red Bull/Toro Rosso alliance, leaving just Renault and McLaren to operate independently.

While Liberty has openly talked about its vision for an F1 of all 10 teams being able to battle it out really closely, having a grid made up of just five entities - with everything tilted towards Mercedes and Ferrari having an even bigger advantage - is not something that will attract fans.

So with the opportunities for 'servant' partnerships so clearly obvious - and being talked about so openly in the paddock - F1 has to make a decision about what it wants as it edges closer to the budget cap arriving.

Wolff conceded that the key was framing the regulations in such a way to ensure that the lines between working together to save costs and working together to help the bigger teams were clearly defined.

"Collaboration existed before between Ferrari and Haas, and then Sauber joined the closed party," he said. "Toro Rosso and Red Bull have existed forever. But I completely understand the worries of McLaren and Renault on the other side.

"It's just a matter of having the right regulations in place to facilitate collaboration where you can save costs, and where you can find synergies - but maintaining the spirit of the F1 regulations, that this is a constructors' championship, should also stay one."

Liberty has a decision to make. Does it play tough and champion the smaller teams by bringing in rules that prevent customer relationships going too far; or does it sit back and risk the prospect of a 'servant' team future for F1?

Force India's popularity as a successful underdog that has been able to punch above its weight should give F1 the answer about what the fans would like to see.