The change of senior management at Audi’s Formula 1 team could be significant for the driver market as new boss Mattia Binotto takes over negotiations.
Only Nico Hulkenberg is committed to Sauber, which will morph into Audi’s 100%-owned works team in 2026, having signed a deal earlier this year to join in 2025.
The effort to find him a team-mate was previously the responsibility of Andreas Seidl and Oliver Hoffmann, both ousted this week from their roles as Audi shook up the management structure of the team side of the operation.
Ex-Sauber/Audi F1 CEO Seidl and chairman of the board of Sauber companies Hoffmann have been axed to make room for Binotto in a dual chief operating officer/chief technical officer position – with Audi’s overall CEO Gernot Dollner becoming Sauber chairman, too.
Binotto is yet to start, although it has been rumoured he may attend this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix, so the formation of his long-term plan to turn Sauber into a team that can fulfil Audi’s ambitions will take time.
A short-term priority, though, must be the driver market – although Binotto may find his options limited in the time he has available before other deals are finalised.
LAST-GASP EFFORT FOR SAINZ?
Binotto’s arrival gives Sauber/Audi a chance to renew negotiations that had stalled under Seidl.
Sainz was a long-term target for Seidl. They worked together at McLaren and Seidl felt Sainz, a multiple race winner at Ferrari but available since it signed Lewis Hamilton for 2025, was the perfect leader for this project.
Audi was initially considered the favourite to sign him, largely due to the absence of big team options, and Seidl was confident. But that started to get undermined by the short-term performance issues for Sauber and creeping doubts about the Audi project, with a complex management structure that ironically has now been simplified.
“The arrival of Mattia to any team is positive, mainly because he has the experience of what it takes to build a team that is a top team,” Sainz said.
“And he has that experience from Ferrari that he can bring into Audi. And I'm sure it's a great asset for them.”
Binotto’s arrival is good for Sainz: if he has not already made his choice. Our latest information as of Friday morning at Spa indicated he has formed a priority order in his mind, and Audi is still in the mix but not the favoured option.
Sainz and Binotto worked together at Ferrari – Binotto was the team boss who signed him – and have a good relationship. There has been initial contact since Binotto’s announcement but nothing in the way of contractual discussions.
Unless Sainz commits to Williams this weekend, there could be time for that. The fundamentals don’t change, and it will take time for Binotto’s vision for Audi to take shape, so that may be too much to overcome on a timeline that works for Sainz. But it is at least a new variable to consider and a new voice in the conversation – and Sainz insisted on Thursday at Spa he was still keeping his options open.
“There's changes to a lot of teams that I'm looking at for next year pretty much every week,” he said.
“There’s evolution on the team market as much as there is on the driver market. And I'm just going to keep giving myself time to take the decision to analyse all these things that keep changing.”
BOTTAS TALKS ‘RESET’
Incumbent driver Valtteri Bottas has always been in the running to stay at Sauber, but the signing of Hulkenberg and pursuit of Sainz made it clear that he was never a first choice. He remains a strong contender for the Williams drive, but according to Bottas the Audi changes mean that talks have been ‘reset’.
“It is going to reset the talks a bit, because we have previously been in communication with Andreas and Oliver, and now it's Mattia. So that will change some things. We need to speak,” he said.
“I think the big part of the remaining driver market is waiting for Carlos' move, that’s no lie. But also not completely relying on that.
“It's a bit of a complicated situation, but let's see. I'm sure the cork will pop at some point.”
Such a reset in talks would likely strengthen Bottas’s case. At worst, he will remain a strong fallback option and at best he could move up the pecking order.
Under the previous regime, there were doubts about whether he was even ahead of long shots such as Theo Pourchaire and Liam Lawson in the queue, but if Sainz still resists Sauber/Audi’s overtures then Bottas could be very well-placed.
Either way, Bottas’s fate does appear to be tied to Sainz. But as he says, he’s not necessarily waiting as there’s every chance that if and when Williams runs out of patience with Sainz then he is its next-in-line. That would suit Bottas, although a serious Audi offer that would keep him at the team for at least a couple of years might possibly change that.
RENEWED HOPE FOR ZHOU
At worst, Zhou’s hopes of staying at Sauber haven’t deteriorated given he was only regarded as effectively a last-resort option by the previous Audi leadership.
Zhou is on the brink of sliding off the grid, but he has renewed optimism that there could be a glimmer of hope.
“I don’t have any news yet because Mattia has not really joined the team,” said Zhou.
“It’s definitely a reset for the management group [who will] try to talk differently and understand what values you can bring, what they want you to [do] and [what they want] to be taking part in this project.
“Things definitely will be changing, a bit more than what was planned before, but from my side I don’t think it changes the overall picture a lot.”
Zhou says “we are talking to different options and Sauber was always one of the options that we’re talking to constantly over the last few weeks” and won’t imagine that he’s suddenly jumped to the front of the queue. However, it gives him at least the chance.
The trouble is that Sauber’s struggles, and myriad factors that have made it difficult to show his best form in a season where he needed to kick on, mean his candidacy has been weakened.
However, there are proven strengths - such as his willingness to be a team player, his good working relationships within the team and the consistency he’s shown over his two-and-a-half years with Sauber - that could at least allow him to further his case with Binotto, even if it’s a long shot.
Zhou's candidacy was such a non-starter under the previous leadership that the team was talking about rookie options like Lawson and Pourchaire over him. Those prospects will likely fade under Binotto - who has shown himself willing to back youth from his time at Ferrari, but who is likely going to prioritise a better short-term option rather than risk writing off 2025 to develop a new driver.
A BLOW FOR HULKENBERG?
The loss of the two people who were “influential” and “we did the deal with” might have rung a few alarm bells for Audi’s only signed F1 driver this week.
Hulkenberg has admitted it was “unexpected”, having learned of the news on the day of the announcement – although Dollner informed him directly.
There’s nothing Hulkenberg can do or say in this situation other than shrug it off and hope for the best.
Inevitably, it would have been a Seidl/Hoffmann pitch that got him onboard, and Seidl in particular given they worked together on Porsche’s LMP1 project that Hulkenberg won the Le Mans 24 Hours with. Losing an ally is never great.
But two individual senior figures were not the reason Hulkenberg joined Audi. It’s a massive career opportunity for him, a huge brand to be attached to, and it’s still a works project with a high upside.
These departures don’t change that - “big projects like this, they never just rely on one or two persons,” as Hulkenberg says – and Binotto coming in means that someone experienced will arrive in their place.
It's “maybe a bit sad” to lose individuals “closely involved with signing me”, Hulkenberg admits, but it’s about the wider project – which he feels Audi has shown it is backing properly.
“It shows that the CEO of Audi and everyone is looking, they're aware, they're involved,” he said.
“The fact that they take action means they're very much involved and invested in it and hands on. I think that's good and positive news.”