Formula 1 says goodbye to Tata as marketing partner

Formula 1 and marketing partner Tata Communications have parted company after eight years working together.

The decision to end their deal - which began in 2012 - appears to have come from Tata's side, with the Indian company saying that it had achieved all it had wanted to from the relationship.

"We have decided to bring to a close our marketing partnership with F1," Amit Sinha Roy, Tata’s Vice President of Marketing, explained on Friday.

"As we had achieved what we set out to do, we feel it’s the right time for us to conclude this marketing partnership."

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As well as F1 as a whole, Tata also has sponsorship deals with both individual teams Mercedes and Williams.

“While our marketing partnership concluded on December 31 2019, we continue working with many of our F1 customers and partners behind the scenes for now."

Tata will likely continue to serve as F1's digital backbone, the company insisting there was no suggestion of bad feelings or disagreements with F1's management, only that the partnership had run its course and that the time had come to move on.

"Our eight-year F1 journey, spanning 150-plus races, was all about driving innovation in the sport," Roy said. "Over the years we have evolved our services portfolio and capabilities.

“We started this partnership in 2012 with the mission to digitally transform the sport whilst raising awareness of our global networking expertise amongst our enterprise customers.

“We’re proud of the fact that for eight years, we played central role in the digital transformation of F1 and its entire ecosystem.

"Enabling the organisation that runs the sport, Formula 1, to innovate; helping the reigning world champions Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport to win; and working with 20-plus broadcasters to bring the action to millions of fans worldwide.

“Our work in F1 also paved the way for new customer relationships with leading broadcasters like Sky and Star Sports, to which we remain committed.

"[Now we will] explore other platforms that will allow us to showcase the full power of our digital services to our key customers."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.