The future of Formula One will become a lot clearer today when the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) announce the entry list for next year's world championship.
It is unlikely to be clear right up until the announcement in Paris, with a meeting taking place last night between the FIA president Max Mosley and the members ofFormula One Teams' Association (FOTA) in London, as to whether it will be the current 10 teams, plus three new entries, or whether there will be an exodus from the sport with new arrivals filling the grid.
Recent weeks have been dominated by debate and rows as controversial proposed regulations for the 2010 season have left the majority of the teams now competing in the series threatening to withdraw after this year's finale in Abu Dhabi on Nov 1, meaning the Yas Marina track could be playing host to the last Formula One race in its current form.
At the crux of the matter is whether the current teams - including Ferrari, McLaren, Renault and BMW - accept regulations for next season that will see, as things stand, an optional budget cap of £40million (Dh241m) brought into the sport - designed to cut costs and also to encourage more participants with only 20 cars currently racing.
The catalyst for the drama was arguably the announcement by Honda in December that they were pulling out of Formula One with immediate effect, blaming the credit crunch for their wish to abandon a project with a reported budget of £182m a year, which the Japanese firm felt was hard to justify in the global economic crisis.
There had been talk of budget caps in the past from Mosley, but when the FIA announced the move, that will incorporate a team's expenses apart from driver salaries, marketing and hospitality expenses in the £40m, it angered FOTA.
What has upset the teams is the fact that they would be heavily penalised if they decided not to go with the budget cap.
Those who agreed to work within the cap would be allowed unlimited testing as well as more technical freedom to develop their chassis during the campaign.
For any team that decided to race but work outside of the optional budget restriction the consequences would be severe.
The testing and technical incentives would not be available to them and they would be at a competitive disadvantage.
Unsurprisingly the teams with the bigger budgets feel they are being penalised for their monetary gains, and that in encouraging new teams to enter the sport, the FIA are doing so at the expense of the existing teams and manufacturers.
A Ferrari statement said: "For the first time ever in F1, the 2010 season will see the introduction of two different sets of regulations based on arbitrary technical rules and economic parameters."
The prospect of a two-tier championship, with one set of cars working to one set of regulations, and others working to different rules, is one that does not appeal to anyone and would make for an unbalanced championship.
Why would manufacturers pour millions into competing in the series only to be at a massive technical disadvantage, with the rules stacked against them?
Throughout last month Renault, BMW, Red Bull and Ferrari announced their intention to withdraw from the sport.
Meetings at the last few races have failed to yield a breakthrough on the issue, despite the best efforts of Bernie Ecclestone, who is the chief executive of Formula One management, with the race drivers predictably backing their teams in the dispute.
The teams did all put in conditional entries ahead of last month's entry deadline, but that was done on the understanding that the budget cap would be dropped and the teams "will be permitted to compete during the 2010 Formula One season on an identical regulatory basis".
FOTA wanted to be allowed to work with the FIA to come up with ways of reducing budgets without affecting the racing, ensuring a level playing field on the track.
But that offer was initially rejected by Mosley, who told the teams if they didn't like the rules to go away and set-up their own series.
The FIA president has since softened his stance and hinted to the teams the budget cap can be withdrawn, but only if they sign up unconditionally first.
He said in a letter to FOTA: "The simplest way to ensure that all entrants run under the same rules would be if everyone entered under the cost-cap rules as published and then all entrants co-operated to agree modifications to those rules which would make the proposition workable for all parties."
It will not be until today that the world finds out if the offer to the teams of "sign first talk later" was accepted when the names of the 13 teams competing is revealed.
Ten teams from outside Formula One have registered interest in racing next year, and three of them will be selected to compete if the existing 10 all agree to continue.
Williams and Force India have signed up unconditionally already, but it is what the other eight teams do that is of interest. If they do not sign then we are left with what will be effectively a new Formula One next year.
But without big names such as Ferrari will the sport be as marketable to spectators and television stations?
A breakaway series has been mooted, but whether it is feasible for the teams to find circuits - Dubai has been mentioned as a possible venue - arrange rules and such before March of next year is questionable at best.
Everything should become a lot more clearer after today's announcement.
When the cars arrive it Abu Dhabi for the first time in late October ahead of the race on Nov 1 it will either be to celebrate the end of an exciting season, or to mark the end of the series in its current form.
gcaygill@thenational.ae
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Stars: Kangana Ranaut, Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Milind Soman, Mahima Chaudhry
Rating: 2/5
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5pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 1,600m
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5.30pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 1,600m
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6pm: Arabian Triple Crown Round-2 Group 3 (PA) Dh300,000 2,200m
Winner: Basmah, Fabrice Veron, Eric Lemartinel
6.30pm: Liwa Oasis Group 2 (PA) Dh300,000 1,400m
Winner: AF Alwajel, Tadhg O’Shea, Ernst Oertel
7pm: Wathba Stallions Cup Handicap (PA) Dh70,000 1,600m
Winner: SS Jalmod, Richard Mullen, Satish Seemar
7.30pm: Handicap (TB) Dh100,000 1,600m
Winner: Trolius, Ryan Powell, Simon Crisford
EU Russia
The EU imports 90 per cent of the natural gas used to generate electricity, heat homes and supply industry, with Russia supplying almost 40 per cent of EU gas and a quarter of its oil.
A State of Passion
Directors: Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi
Stars: Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah
Rating: 4/5
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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Email sent to Uber team from chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi
From: Dara
To: Team@
Date: March 25, 2019 at 11:45pm PT
Subj: Accelerating in the Middle East
Five years ago, Uber launched in the Middle East. It was the start of an incredible journey, with millions of riders and drivers finding new ways to move and work in a dynamic region that’s become so important to Uber. Now Pakistan is one of our fastest-growing markets in the world, women are driving with Uber across Saudi Arabia, and we chose Cairo to launch our first Uber Bus product late last year.
Today we are taking the next step in this journey—well, it’s more like a leap, and a big one: in a few minutes, we’ll announce that we’ve agreed to acquire Careem. Importantly, we intend to operate Careem independently, under the leadership of co-founder and current CEO Mudassir Sheikha. I’ve gotten to know both co-founders, Mudassir and Magnus Olsson, and what they have built is truly extraordinary. They are first-class entrepreneurs who share our platform vision and, like us, have launched a wide range of products—from digital payments to food delivery—to serve consumers.
I expect many of you will ask how we arrived at this structure, meaning allowing Careem to maintain an independent brand and operate separately. After careful consideration, we decided that this framework has the advantage of letting us build new products and try new ideas across not one, but two, strong brands, with strong operators within each. Over time, by integrating parts of our networks, we can operate more efficiently, achieve even lower wait times, expand new products like high-capacity vehicles and payments, and quicken the already remarkable pace of innovation in the region.
This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval in various countries, which we don’t expect before Q1 2020. Until then, nothing changes. And since both companies will continue to largely operate separately after the acquisition, very little will change in either teams’ day-to-day operations post-close. Today’s news is a testament to the incredible business our team has worked so hard to build.
It’s a great day for the Middle East, for the region’s thriving tech sector, for Careem, and for Uber.
Uber on,
Dara
