Frédéric Vasseur takes the helm of Sauber

Sauber announced shortly before the Baku weekend that Monisha Kaltenborn was leaving the team with immediate effect. The team took its time to officially announce the name of her successor, but it is a heavyweight in motorsports.

Indeed, Frédéric Vasseur is the co-founder, along with Nicolas Todt, of the ASM team, later renamed ART Grand Prix. This team has simply won everything in Formula 3, then in GP2 and GP3. He is also the one who launched Spark, which supplied all the Formula E cars when the discipline was launched.

Pascal Picci, the chairman of the board, was therefore straightforward in announcing the appointment of the Frenchman as head of the team and CEO of Sauber Motorsport: Frédéric Vasseur’s long and successful career in international motorsport speaks for itself. We are delighted to welcome him to Sauber.

If the confirmation was somewhat delayed, it is highly likely that both parties intensely negotiated the role and responsibilities of the new strongman. It is thus very likely that Frédéric Vasseur ensured he would not find himself in the position he was in last year at Renault, when the political game within the company with the diamond logo made him the figurehead of the team, but he did not have full control over what was happening there. Faced with differing views with Cyril Abiteboul, he then chose to slam the door during the off-season.

He will therefore have to tackle the integration of Honda as the engine supplier, which has begun its collaboration in view of next season. Given the problems that the Japanese manufacturer is currently facing with McLaren, the task promises to be extremely challenging, especially since he will also have to help in the recovery of a team that has been accustomed to the back of the grid for several seasons already.

With the participation of www.racingbusiness.fr