RB team boss Laurent Mekies says the team’s future aerodynamic facility adjacent to Red Bull’s campus in Milton Keynes is expected to come online by the end of 2024.
RB’s headquarters have historically always been – and will remain – located in Faenza, Italy. But over the years, the team has also operated a small facility in Bicester, a town nestled within the UK's "motorsport valley."
However, with RB relying since 2022 on Red Bull’s larger-scale wind tunnel for its development, vacating entirely the Bicester unit and relocating the team’s aerodynamics operations to a dedicated facility in Melton Keynes made perfect sense.
The improved infrastructure will not only provide RB with all the cutting-edge resources to optimize car development its location within the UK’s motorsport hub should also attract a wider pool of skilled personnel for the team.
Finally, housing both RB’s aerodynamics department in close proximity to Red Bull’s main campus will foster a closer collaboration and communication between the two teams.
“In Bicester, we have the aero department, concept design and part of the design office – all in a location chosen to be close to the wind tunnel,” explained Mekies.
“Fifteen years ago, the team was smaller than it is today, and Bicester made sense. Today, the aero department has tripled in size; we no longer use this tunnel because we have another one, and the location is no longer suitable.
“So, we will leave it at the end of the year and move to a new facility in Milton Keynes, next to the Red Bull campus.”
The technical alliance between Red Bull Racing and its sister outfit, while within F1’s regulations, has been frowned upon by several rival outfits, and especially by McLaren boss Zak Brown who believes that the collaborative partnership is beneficial to both teams.
There are also concerns that the situation could lead to personnel moving from one team to the other, a claim that Mekies dismissed.
“The regulations are very clear,” he stated. “It is very well defined that you cannot use the transfer of personnel to bypass the regulation regarding [intellectual property]. So, you cannot move a person from team A to team B in order to transfer knowledge.
“Now, in our case, I can say that these transfers were infrequent, but every time there was a transfer we asked the FIA whether the move of a technician or an engineer in a specific role was to be considered in line with what was specified in the regulation.
“And we have always acted only after receiving the OK from the FIA."
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