Red Bull team head Christian Horner believes Porsche “got a bit too ahead of themselves” in their decision to announce a merger with them.
Porsche’s desire to enter F1 has been one of the sport’s worst kept secrets and a deal was expected to take place between the two firms for a partnership starting in 2026.
However, it fell through as Red Bull was not keen on giving up 50 per cent of its stake to the newcomers.
Although this does not mean that Porsche has given up its desire to find a route into the sport, this is now almost surely not going to involve Red Bull.
Negotiations were so far along that the announcement of this merger were going to take place in August itself, after Porsche submitted documents to Morocco’s Conseil de la Concurrence.
Horner explained why the talks fell through.
“Big organisations need significant planning and perhaps they started getting a little bit ahead of themselves,” he said.
“There was never a binding commitment signed between the parties so that must have been subjective or conjecture on their part.”
Horner dismisses Porsche merger chances even in original schedule
In the early phase of the season, this deal looked almost set in stone and the only hurdle was believed to be the 2026 engine regulations to be approved by the FIA.
However, there was a delay in the voting which pushed the process back.
When the regulations were finally announced by the World Motor Sport Council in August, there was no announcement from either team, which sparked speculation of a breakdown in negotiations.
Horner believes that things would not have panned out any differently even if the voting had finished as per the original date.
“There were so many things within the engine regs that were still to be fixed,” Horner said.
“Actually, there are still probably quite a few elements that need further discussion and fine-tuning within those regulations.
“The FIA have done their best to accommodate newcomers into the sport.
“From a technical perspective, large elements of the engine have been carried over so it makes the job of the newcomers harder, particularly without a significant offset in the development phase in the next three to four years.
“I guess they have come up with a set of regulations that are a compromise that probably nobody is entirely happy with but that means they have achieved a middle-ground.”
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