The Weekly Grapevine

Another takeover

On Sunday afternoon in Melbourne, Aguri Suzuki was unaware of how his eponymous team were faring in the race. Just how long he sat in the shade of a tree outside the temporary huts supplied to each team by the organisers is unknown, but the Japanese former Formula One driver sat there on his own for an appreciable length of time.

But, then, Suzuki had a lot on his mind, for it was likely the penultimate time the red and white cars would run under his direction and surname. But, at least Suzuki was around: his able lieutenant Daniel Audetto, the man without whom there would be no Super Aguri, was nowhere to be seen, and rumours had it that the former Ferrari team boss was finished with F1 after sinking half his life into the sport.

Hiroshi Yasukawa, Aguri Suzuki, and Martin Leach © Super Aguri F1

But, also sitting under the same tree, although far from alone, was Martin Leach, former Ford Europe COO and Maserati boss, whose Magma Group automotive consultancy admitted to reaching (heads of) agreement to acquire Super Aguri, probably by 31 March.

"There are different jurisdictions involved (thought to be the United Kingdom and Japan), so we have a lot of documents to translate," Leach told autosport.com on Saturday, "but we are hopeful of completing the purchase by the end of this month."

Leach (51), and not Australian-born as popularly held ("some journalist once erroneously referred to me as Australian, and the honorary citizenship has stuck"), would not be drawn on the source of the funding, although he did deny that Russian funding - via the GAZ Group on whose board Leach sits - was involved.

A long time motor racing fan ("I would prefer not be called a 'nut', though"), Leach approved various F1 deals on behalf of the Blue Oval during his 24 years with the company. He once strapped himself into a Jaguar R2 F1 car for an executive test, and has a true car-man pedigree.

Having graduated in 1979 with an Honours degree in Automotive Engineering, the former F2000 racer oversaw the rebirth of Ford's iconic RS brand and conceptualized Ford's present product range before heading to Maserati on the back of a US$2m Ford payoff. There he revamped the range before forming Magma.

So much for the man, what about the money? On rumours that Dubai Durham were providing the means for the takeover of a team said to be so close to the edge that engine-supplier Honda recently attached mechanics tools, Leach's was short and to the point: "I can't comment, but we will be releasing a statement when the deal is done."

But, he was vocal regarding the rationale behind Magma taking over Aguri. "When we formed Magma we did so to provide automotive product consultancy services as opposed to an automotive engineering consultancy, and with Formula One being at the very pinnacle of motorsport, it is where Magma has to be," explained the man who saved Eddie Jordan's bacon on more than one occasion by supplying the yellow cars with engines when others steered clear.

So far, so good, if only because the entire affair continues F1's tradition of finding saviours for cash-strapped teams just before the Australian Grand Prix, but why is it automotive consultancies ignore the bitter lessons taught by history and take on Formula One projects?

Over the years various consultancies with F1 links have come to grief, and it cannot be coincidental that Lotus, the TWR Group and Prodrive all burnt (or worse) their fingers in F1, whereas the world's largest provider of such services, Porsche, seems intent on staying away from motorsport's top formula despite legendary success in other categories.

Porsche's first entry into Grand Prix racing, the 1960 type 718, Formula Two car © LAT

Where the company has been involved, it has been with mixed success: when it was paid for its consultancy work (as it was by McLaren in the mid-eighties), it delivered three consecutive drivers and two constructors titles. But when it bankrolled an in-house engine project (for Arrows, as it transpired), it ended in tears and shame.

But, back to the first point: In 2001, the Minardi outfit, on its last legs, was rescued by the wiry Melbourne-born aviation entrepreneur/certified petrolhead Paul Stoddart in the run-up to his home Grand Prix. Jordan, too, was given a shot at survival shortly before the opening race of 2005, and now it seems Super Aguri has been saved from extinction with less than a week to go to the start of the season.

But, where Minardi's saviour came from outside the motorsport industry (although Stoddart had spent years accumulating F1 kit), and the acquisition of Jordan by the Russian-Canadian Midland Group always had a naive ring to it, in Super Aguri's case it is virtually a case of two tenants of a property getting into bed together, for both rent the premises in which they are neighbours.

A series of eerie coincidences and not a little mystery surrounds the whole affair. Super Aguri came into Formula One on a wing and a prayer in 2006 with a brace of hurriedly re-engineered Arrows A23 chassis which had been designed and manufactured in premises Leafield, Oxfordshire.

Said premises used to serve as headquarters of Tom Walkinshaw's TWR Group, the holding company of Arrows and various of the Scot's automotive consultancies.

TWR plunged into liquidation on the back of Arrows's seven unsuccessful seasons at the top level under his ownership, and various assets, mainly facilities, were taken over by a consortium involving the Menard group and former F1 driver (with Arrows) and Indianapolis 500 winner Eddie Cheever.

The latter soon departed, but not before they transformed the TWR Group (sans Arrows) into Menard Competition Technologies and Menard Engineering Limited, companies aimed at providing engineering and consulting services to the motor and motorsport industries - with Menard's own IRL campaigns pencilled in at the top of the list.

Then, in November 2006, Menard, a US-based DIY chain, announced it had sold MCT and MEL to Magma Group, which fused the two companies and renamed the fused entity Ultramotive., which in turn rented the premises from Menard.

Super Aguri, headed by Aguri Suzuki, the former Arrows racer and first Japanese to score a F1 podium, had between Menard's purchase and sale of the consultancies, moved into a section of the Leafield facility on a tenancy basis.

Takuma Sato, Super Aguri SA08A © LAT

Small and compact Super Aguri's portion was, yes, but given that customer cars would apparently be welcome in the sport from 2008 onwards and the team figured it found a loophole to permit it to use Honda's RA106 in 2007, no more was needed.

Thus, armed with Honda's race-winning 2006 car, Super Aguri last year went racing out of Leafield despite being threatened with arbitration by F1 tough man Colin Kolles of Spyker (formerly Midland, nee Jordan, now Force India). Decent results followed, but by mid-season the team's ex-Minardi motorhomes were all but empty: a major sponsor had reneged on its commitments, and cut-backs were the order of the day.

When the team withdrew from testing, then failed to appear at the launch of its SA008, the writing appeared on the wall, and although rumours of takeovers - first by Spanish nobleman Alejandro Agag, then by the Indian Spice Group, (not to be confused with the singing beauties who graced McLaren's 1997 launch), or, for whatever reason, by major creditor Honda.

Less than a week ago rumours had it that the Oxfordshire bailiffs were circling pending the outcome of talks with Magma. Said talks seem to have had legs, and on Monday before the Melbourne race the team issued the following media release, stating that, in effect, Super Aguri had been saved by Magma:

"Super Aguri F1 Team is pleased to announce that in the light of recent media speculation, we have reached agreement with Magma Group regarding the acquisition of the Super Aguri F1 Team. Magma has also reached agreement with Honda Motor Co. Ltd regarding technical cooperation and engine supply to Super Aguri F1 Team. It is expected that the acquisition process will be completed over the next few weeks. We will not be making any further comment or announcement until that time."

But, the plot thickens: listed as CEO of Magma Executive Strategy, a sister to Ultramotive in Magma's pecking order, is merchant banker and F1 mergers and acquisitions specialist Nicky Samengo-Turner, who has advised various parties, including Jordan, Ferrari, Prodrive and Ricardo on M&As.

In fact, Samengo-Turner, whose family owned the Bowmaker Lola team as run in the world championship in the sixties by Alfred Moss, father of Stirling, mounted a takeover bid for Jordan on behalf of Christian Horner and engineered the sale of 50% of Prodrive to private equity company Apax Partners, so has experienced both sides of the fence.

When called for comment on the deal, Samengo-Turner was polite but curt: "I couldn't possibly help, I haven't spoken to Martin (Leach) for a week." Asked about this rather strange situation, Leach admitted he had not been in recent contact with Samengo-Turner as "we have been travelling extensively", but in times of global mobile communications systems, it does seem strange...

The Leafield Technical Centre © Super Aguri F1

But then, the curse of Leafield has sucked in numerous parties, starting with Scott and devouring Arrows, TWR Group, Menard and Cheever en route to Super Aguri. In fact, the only party to have so far escaped unscathed is Magma, and the group has only been in the premises for 18 months...

Of course, superstition and F1 are uncomfortable bedfellows, and it may just be coincidence that the doomed Arrows team and its many associates have been so affected. And, it may be pure coincidence that so many automotive consultancies with fingers in the F1 pie got badly burnt over the years.

An entire team is hoping that all of the foregoing is coincidental Super Aguri desperately needs saving, for the sport desperately needs more than 10 teams, particular at the start of F1's 'new dawn', when no less than 12 teams were promised by the sport's controlling body, the FIA.

And, based on his track record (pun unintentional), Leach is about the best qualified saviour Suzuki could have wished for as he sat in the shade of the tree.