Aston Martin owner Stroll to invest £200m in new HQ for F1 team
Aston Martin owner Lawrence Stroll will put up to £200m into a new manufacturing headquarters for the marque’s Formula 1 team.
In an interview with the FT, the Canadian billionaire said he was aiming to increase the team’s valuation to £1bn over the next five years.
The 37,000 square metre campus is located near British Grand Prix racetrack Silverstone in Northamptonshire.
Construction on the new facility is expected to be completed by early 2023, having previously been delayed by the pandemic.
Stroll also said that he was looking to expand the 550-strong team by hiring hundreds of new staff.
Having made his fortune in high-end fashion firms like Ralph Lauren and Michael Kors, Stroll, whose son Lance drives for Aston Martin, led a £500m rescue bid for the UK car firm last year.
Then, using his existing ownership of Racing Point, the F1 team he bought for £90m in 2018, he brought Aston Martin back to motorsport for the first time in 60 years.
He has managed to sign four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel to the team, a major coup for the new outfit.
He told the FT that he would go ahead with the new investment despite recent supply shortages pushing up costs.
“Steel’s gone up, lumber has gone up, labour prices have gone up because of a shortage of labour. We probably have a 10 per cent cost increase pre-Covid price to post-Covid price.”