Sauber’s recent decision to open a branch in England has brought back into focus a topic that has resurfaced cyclically for the past forty years. Once the ‘Sauber Motorsport Technology Centre UK’ is inaugurated, Ferrari will be the only Formula 1 team without a technological outpost in what is effectively a “motor valley.” This area, northwest of London, includes locations with names familiar to enthusiasts, such as Brackley, Milton Keynes, Woking, Enstone, and Grove.
It is estimated that the Formula 1 sector in this region employs more than eight thousand people, with a high percentage under the age of forty. The market for specialized professionals is particularly dynamic; beyond the well-known figures familiar to the general public, there are hundreds of professionals who switch teams every year, seizing salary opportunities and continuing their career growth. Sauber’s decision confirms the strategic importance of having a branch in the heart of the Formula 1 world, with Ferrari as the sole exception.
Racing Bulls began last year to establish a substantial working group in Milton Keynes, within Red Bull’s new campus, which will also include a wind tunnel. The team’s main headquarters remain in Faenza, but having a branch in England allows access to the specialized job market without necessarily requiring candidates to make a major life decision, such as relocating to another country. Sauber has adopted the same strategy; the exact location of its UK headquarters has not yet been chosen, but the program is underway.
Technology has therefore eliminated distances. It is no coincidence that two teams arrived at the same solution within just over a year. The convergence towards this decision has been driven by communication systems that have revolutionized interactions between multiple locations.
Almost forty years ago, Ferrari was forced to open a branch in Guildford, Surrey, to accommodate the demands of John Barnard, the technical mind behind McLaren’s triumphs between 1984 and 1986, who had been strongly desired by Enzo Ferrari. The British designer had no intention of relocating to Maranello and managed to secure from the Scuderia a headquarters just nine miles from McLaren’s base, where he had worked for six years.
However, the early days were far from ideal, with communication issues significantly impacting the work. One of the most curious problems arose when Maranello began producing the first parts of the car designed in Guildford: technicians noticed that the margins were not in line with John Barnard’s well-known meticulous precision. It took time to realize that the drawings, sent via fax, suffered slight scale variations due to transmission methods. Today, such stories bring a smile, as videoconferencing, remote-access systems, and real-time resource sharing through fiber optics have revolutionized communication, enabling the now-common practice of smart working even with a simple home connection.
An Italian engineer confirmed that the only thing missing was coffee breaks and added that, in purely work-related terms, it made no difference whether a colleague was sitting at the desk next to them or thousands of kilometers away.
If we take the most recent case, namely Sauber, the difficulties encountered in the recruitment campaign necessary to meet Audi’s ambitious plans were primarily linked to relocation.
Asking an engineer to move their family from England to Switzerland is not the same as offering a job just a few kilometers away, and for those who need to hire experienced personnel, there is only one talent pool to draw from: the British “motor valley.”
In this scenario, the cost cap has also become a factor. Last summer, it was Sauber that raised the issue of staff salaries, which are aligned with a cost of living that varies from country to country. There is a significant discrepancy between average Swiss and British wages, and for this reason, the FIA has been asked to introduce a parameter in the financial regulations that would put all teams on an equal footing.
Maranello therefore remains the last European stronghold. With Sauber’s technological outpost and Haas’s fragmented structure (with locations in Italy, England, Germany, and the United States), Ferrari is set to remain the only Formula 1 team without a branch in the United Kingdom.
The traumatic experience in Guildford (which was nicknamed in Maranello “the factory of excuses”) is now a distant memory, but it is not those remnants that make the Italian side an independent entity. Ferrari can still rely on the allure of the ‘red’ challenge, which works in its favor—when an engineer receives an offer from Maranello, it has a special appeal. It may not be for everyone, but the percentage of those drawn to it still remains high.
Over the past year and a half, the recruitment campaign led by Ferrari team principal Frédéric Vasseur has been quite successful. Many engineers from UK-based teams have joined Maranello, with more set to arrive in the coming months. Adrian Newey declined, but in his case, the need to leave England for Italy was just one of several reasons (and certainly not the main one) that led the legendary car designer to turn down the chance to wear red.
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