Mattia Binotto: a 2023 F1 season as an observer
On 29 November 2022, Scuderia Ferrari announced through a press release that it had accepted the resignation of Mattia Binotto from the role of team principal and managing director of the Maranello team, a choice made by the Italian engineer dictated by the fact that he no longer felt the necessary trust on the part of the top management of the Prancing Horse, namely president John Elkann and managing director Benedetto Vigna.
On December 31, the contract that linked Mattia Binotto to Ferrari ended a year early and for this reason the former number one of the Italian pit wall will take a gardening leave period of at least six months if not even one year before possibly joining another Formula 1 team that will be neither Red Bull nor Mercedes given that Toto Wolff underlined that in the past there have been too many differences with Mattia Binotto to put behind (above all the veto placed by Ferrari on Toto Wolff’s aspirations of becoming the CEO of FOM for Liberty Media).
Bahrain not from the pit wall, but from the TV
“I glanced at the Netflix series, but I’m not a fan of these things. The new Formula 1 championship? I will certainly watch the first race, God forbid. And I will cheer for Ferrari”, the words of Mattia Binotto ahead of the start of the championship reported by today’s edition of the Italian newspaper Il Resto Del Carlino according to which the former Ferrari team principal has an offer from Audi on the table, a manufacturer that will make its Formula 1 debut in 2026 following a progressive takeover of the shares of Sauber. The team has its headquarters in Hinwil (Switzerland), a solution that is also logistically more than favorable for Mattia Binotto which could guarantee Andreas Seidl and the Audi project skills invaluable for the construction of a power unit.
The SF-23 remains “his” car
The SF-23 with which Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz will go in search of glory this season is obviously designed by Mattia Binotto’s management, characterized by a horizontal structure at the level of technical organization chart. The figure of technical director, for example, is no longer present in Ferrari after Mattia Binotto initially held both the positions of technical director and team principal.
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Subsequently, the technical direction was divided into macro areas with Enrico Cardile, David Sanchez and Enrico Gualtieri in charge of chassis, aerodynamics and power unit. Frederic Vasseur has not yet intervened in the technical management level, for now the big change of the Ferrari pit wall for the 2023 F1 season is the absence of chief strategist Inaki Rueda, as greater responsibility was given to Ravin Jain.
Fred Vasseur is ‘only’ general manager
Compared to Mattia Binotto, the Frenchman who arrived from Sauber is not managing director as well as team principal, but only general manager. It is therefore probable that the CEO Benedetto Vigna in 2023 will be able to increase the range of action at the decision-making level. In fact, this season in Ferrari there are many figures who have to prove that they are worth the position they currently hold.
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