It's an exciting new chapter. As you look out more broadly at kind of the next few years of F1, what are the growth levers that you're most excited about? To the mic, please.
Thank you, Shane. Thank you all for joining, either through the webcast or in person. Look, I think we're blessed that there's an opportunity actually in all of the lines of the business. We've seen major uptick in broadcast, for example, in the U.S. this year, and I think we have opportunity to grow broadcast really around the globe, particularly as we've seen new digital entrants begin to become bidders or potential bidders on airing our product rather. In addition, we've seen growth in our own digital product, which I think speaks well to why they might find it appealing. If you look at the line around promotions, obviously, we're gonna have a major uptick this year with Vegas. We're also seeing increases in our promoter fees everywhere we renew.
Why are they willing to pay us more? Partly competition, because there are more cities that want to have a race, but also, the fact is that they're able to grow their races, have higher attendance at higher prices. All that bodes well, I think, for that line. Then the sponsorship line. Brandon here in the front row, we can put him on the spot. We've nearly tripled pro sponsorship over the last three years. I think it's about that, about right. I'm expecting Brandon will triple it again in the next three years. No, we'll have... I think there's a lot of opportunity. Vegas actually, I think, can be a great kickstart for that. We've seen it both ways.
We've seen anticipation, some new sponsors coming in because of Vegas and the work that Brandon and Renee have done, and Emily. Also, I think once we have the event in Vegas, there's gonna be a whole new recognition for Formula 1 in the United States, which still is our most important sponsorship market. You know, a night race down the strip, that's gonna be iconic, that 10 o'clock view. I think few Americans will not have seen that view at some point. That is gonna be on every piece of television imaginable. I think that is gonna kick off a new round of sponsor interest as well, and more broad sponsor interest. We have some great brands, we're very happy with, but I think we'll continue to broaden out.
You've seen some of that already with the brands that are coming in and entering are probably more in the consumer mindset, the broader consumer mindset. Some of the other lines, like, you know, hospitality, we've seen only growth in Paddock Club interest, Paddock Club size, Paddock Club pricing. I'm pretty excited about every line of the, frankly, in the P&L. I don't know if Brandon or Stefano, if you'd like to add anything.
I would say that you were very spot on. I mean, I can see that the opportunity of Vegas will just enhance the visibility and awareness in this market that is huge. I believe that there is a lot of room to take with all the different products in the mainstream that we have in our P&L. I think that the American audience will really understand better in growing up the attention. Next, in one month, we're gonna be in Miami, in October, gonna be in Austin, and we're gonna be in November here. I think this just really are building up more and more attention that will spread all around the world.
I would say today, I think that in a humble way, we should be very, very proud of what we are doing because I think that we are stepping up the level of the game. I would say that yesterday, I had the privilege of being with Greg in the sport meeting with other commissioners of the American sport. It's great to share the fact that also they realize that we are there. Just a couple of years ago, I mean, I think that for Adam or for Roger, it would be very difficult to say what is Formula 1. I would say they recognize us, and we were sharing something, for example, related to the format. We don't have to stop.
We don't have to be compliance with the old guys that are saying, "If there is a change, oh my God, what is happening?" I think on that, we take the lead, and we want to keep the lead as a sport business. I would say all is looking good, but as always, when everything is looking good, we need to be humble and making sure we do the right thing. I'm sure that later on, Renee will have the chance to explain what is the incredible expectation that we are having here. Of course, for us, it's very, very crucial to have the best experience ever for our fans that will come here in Vegas.
I'll go to that right now, Renee. Question we received: I know we're still a few months out from the Vegas race. Wondering if you could talk a bit more about the vision and the opportunity in Vegas over the coming years? Any initiatives or ideas that eventually you'd like to incorporate that maybe aren't being done in year one, maybe early learnings also taking on the promoter role?
Sure. Thank you, Shane. I would say year one is going to be a lot of learning. We're hoping to get a lot right. We wanna create just the most incredible fan experience we can, and also create a great track for the drivers. We want our team principals happy, really trying to create the best event throughout the ecosystem. I'm sure we won't get everything right in year one, and we're gonna take those learnings, and we're going to improve upon the event in years two and beyond. We are blessed to have Clark County having already given us a 10-year approval to keep racing. When we convinced Greg to spend all that money on the land and the building, I think it was probably with a plan to race for more than just a handful of years.
We're gonna look to recreate, really reinvent ourselves. What can we do differently around talent, around customer activations? Early feedback is we need more general admission. Our fans are not happy we don't have more general admission. That is something that we're going to address in follow-on years. I think at this point, all we can do is, you know, head down, work hard, and look forward to what's to come.
If I could add on Vegas. You know, I think there will clearly be a learning curve. We came to Vegas with a whole bunch of objectives. First, to be a promoter, partly because we had ideas about what great promoters should do, and we probably thought if we were gonna opine on that to some of our promoter partners, we might actually wanna be a promoter so we could walk the walk as well as talking the talk. We also thought that Vegas was a great opportunity for all the reasons we've talked about economically. Also is really a great showcase.
Our goal here should be to be, sorry to all of you in the audience, be long-term greedy in the sense that, we're gonna have a high revenue stream here, we're gonna have a high cost stream here, but it's more important that we have a great experience for everybody involved than that we coin it the first year. I think we will make a lot of money in Vegas over the long term. I'm very excited. I think we will make money, good money this year. Way more important than that is that we have a great experience for our drivers, for our patrons, for our... You know, bringing in the Augusta thing. For our fans, for our viewers, for, you know, everybody involved. That's the goal.
Related. Investors see the opportunity on race promotion from self-promoting, essentially giving us potentially more leverage with our partners. Can you speak more about to what degree this could become a change? Were there other markets where you would maybe look to self-promote, or how can you leverage the learnings from taking on the promoter role? Maybe start with Stefano, and then others add on.
I think that what Greg says about Las Vegas was a clear opportunity that was important for us to take to maximize from one side, what we believe a promoter should do, on the other side, to leverage on this experience. I would say that the beauty of today is that we have a great bunch of promoters. Due to the competition that is around the world, everyone is really not only in terms of, let's say, contribution, financial contribution, they are getting better and better in preparing new experience for the fans, investing in new facilities, that is good. Already the effect on being asked to promote here has really induced everyone to be better because, of course, we are there to make the best business ever.
Therefore, if there will be other opportunity, for sure we'll not be shy. I think that on the other hand, I think that we are very lucky that today, the quality of promoters around the world is really very strong.
They've raised their game. I would say in part, I credit the F1 management team for historically, the promoters were kind of on their own. Prior management called them the victims, extracting money from them. I think we've tried to take a perspective, really credit to Stefano, and before that, Chase and team, Chloe, of saying, "How do we create the best experience?" Bringing them together to talk about shared experience. At my table, when somebody was asking, you know, "Are the U.S. promoters looking at you negatively?" I see they think the growth in the whole sport is good, and the best experience that they can learn from and have best practice shared is actually helping them all raise their game and do better and make more money.
You know, a lot of reporters try to create dissension where there doesn't exist among us and the Dolans and Bobby. The reality is, Tyler and Bobby and I are talking quite a bit. We're talking about sharing resources. We're talking about how we can leverage each other's activations in terms of what's working and what's not. We do believe that, you know, rising waters raises all ships, and that's the intention. It's not to galvanize or cannibalize anyone else in the process of building something here in Vegas.
How do you think about the three American U.S. races, right? How do you think about maybe differentiating them? Are there brand identities to each year one and maybe beyond year one as well?
Well, I think that is pretty clear that every racing, not only America, has a different personality, a different cultural approach, has different quality, a different segmentation of fans. I think that having two races here in the U.S. By the way, sometimes we forget that just a couple of years ago, we were thinking, do we really need to stay in U.S.? Is really the market we should be on. Thanks to the stubbornness, is it the right way to say that, of us, we are here.
How about tenacity?
Tenacity. Sorry for my words. I would say we had two races last year with Miami. This year we're adding another one. In the blink of an eye, we are getting there. I think that as Greg was mentioning before, and also Renee, I mean, now also Austin was the 1st, 2nd Miami. Understand that it's just a bigger benefit for everyone. I don't see any kind of cannibalization. Everyone is different. Everything is different. Events are different. Quality is different. I don't see any problem with that.
Look, each of them is gonna have things that are unique and distinctive. The fan festivals at Austin, given where it is and the spread it has, are not gonna be matched either Miami or in Las Vegas. That's not. The contours, what's available doesn't do it. The tower that they have, the concert that they have, the way they do it on that's hard to beat. That's a very distinct experience. What Miami has, there's gonna be no beach here. There's not gonna be the same thing. Miami has a lot of things that are very distinctive as well. Obviously, those are races that are on tracks or different form, Miami different than Austin. We're gonna be a street race on a very different form and a night race.
They all have distinctive differences, and I think they will all develop their character. Miami's fairly new. We're totally new. They'll develop their character and their distinctiveness over time.
Stefano, how do you view the optimal mix of races on the calendar, and how do you balance historic versus fly away?
Well, actually, I think that the balance we are now is pretty good. I mean, as you know, this year we had to give up the possibility to be in China due to the COVID restriction and COVID uncertainty. I would say in term of numbers, 24 is the right number, and the mix in the continents that we are having today, I think is looking good. I would say that in term of, in term of a possibility in the future, as you know, there's no signal on that. We're still seeing if there is a chance to go to Africa, because it's the only country that is missing. On the other hand, I would say the only comment that I'm always saying to our promoters, when historic is only looking behind, that is something that is not good.
When historic is a good foundation to look ahead with a different future, that is beautiful. That's why, with the so-called historical Grand Prix, we are really focusing in understanding what is the view of the future. I mean, to be, to be arrogant and believe in that, you have a granted future because you had a race since 100 years, to be very honest, is not enough. As a sign of respect, it's not enough for the tradition of these places. I think that, in this moment, everyone is understanding that, and we are not playing any game. We are very transparent with them.
We have said that if they want to be in the calendar, they need to do the things that we believe is right for them, and also for us as Formula 1. I think that the number and the quality of races are respecting also the so-called historical one. It's pretty clear that in the last couple of years, the perception from these historical places has changed because they realize that the landscape is different.
Okay. Thank you. Greg, I just wanted to ask about, you know, to the degree you can address it, the discussion around M&A. There's been obviously a reporting about maybe some overtures. Not asking you to comment specifically on things, generally. You know, you guys are known as people who know how to hold, know how to manage, when you buy, when you sell. You have a whole, you know, you have multi-class share structure here. Have a lot of kind of things in your discretion. What can you tell us about how you think about, you know, appetite for you to think about options and for others to look at this to kind of manage that? How meaningful is that at this point?
Thanks, Gordon. You know, you've had a long history, as has many in this room with us. You know, given just this tracking stock structure we have, the likelihood that we would have be a near-term seller seems unlikely, right? Because we'd be incurring corporate level tax. You know, that's anathema to us, and would not be good for our shareholders. More importantly, you know, as far as what the opportunity is, we think it was kind of funny that some of the comments that, oh, the now the prices that were allegedly discussed at, you know, meetings that I never had, but okay, allegedly it was in, they didn't seem like high prices at all. We think there's more opportunity here.
We're long-term holders because we see some of the things I outlined, early on, I mean, pointing the finger on Brandon to deliver more sponsorship for us. No, I do think there's a huge opportunity. This is a good place for our capital to be, and we think we're gonna compound well. We have compounded well. We bought in at $21 bucks a share. I don't know, I think it was mid-70s, you know, to this morning, mid-low 70s. Been a pretty good run. We think there's more to go. We also think there's a lot of opportunities that are gonna open up potentially for other places to put our capital. You're seeing some of it here, what we've invested in Las Vegas, over $500 million. We think we're gonna get a very good return on that money.
I think we're gonna see opportunities around the sport to grow elements and put our capital to work. Could be M&A related. You know, we've looked at other things in the past that were around the sport, where we thought we could be synergistic and add value. I think there are some of those. We are constantly looking at those, and I think there are a couple now that are attractive. The success, who knows? We haven't bought anything in the last three or four years. Maybe that was smart or maybe it was stupid, but, you know, pretty much been a fact. I think we will see more opportunities now in this kind of environment we've excelled in the past, and I hope we can excel again.
Thanks. Hi, Peter Supino, Wolfe Research. To the extent that the Las Vegas Grand Prix gives your team a template of best practices for how to make even more money at these events, how long does it take you to use that and globalize it and encourage your partners to learn from the example and drive up the value of other events?
Stefano, you want?
Yes. Well, I think that Renee was saying something very important. We need to be humble. We know what to do, but also, I think that we put in place ideas that other promoters take with a lot of experience. I think that the chance for us to create the perfect experience for our fans will be, of course, be able to be used as an input to other promoters in a way that could be respected the differentiation of every Grand Prix, because that's something that is key for us. Every single Grand Prix has to be different, unique. The quality on the top, of course. I think that we're gonna be, the Monday after the race, the debriefing we're gonna have together, I think will be very important.
From that, we're gonna send a lot of inputs to our friends that will looking at us. The first they're gonna see this Grand Prix with a different eye will be the promoters that are working with us since many, many years. Of course, it's also for us, a big challenge in a positive way, to show what we believe is the right thing to do. Therefore, it's a good place where we can, for sure, learn and improve the ecosystem in the right way. I'm very positive about it. I think at the end of the day, next year, you know, everyone will benefit from the experience that we're gonna have here in Vegas.
Let me just add one thing that we have a phrase sometimes called stealing with pride. What I mean by that is, we wanna share with all of our promoters best practices, right? The things that work, that we know that we can scale and we can bring to other partners so that they elevate their game. We have a group of people inside the company who are focused on building those best practices and sharing them with the rest of our promoters, so that we are raising the game across the board and talking about what works and what doesn't work well. There are other sports industries that do this quite well, but we're gonna build on that as well.
We want to make sure that we take the things that work and help them be implemented in other markets in the way that they should be in that, in that market.
If I can, Greg, I would just add to that. We've found this even over the last 12 months, that we're more sympathetic to the promoters. Because now we actually understand what they go through day in and day out, dealing with permitting, dealing with track design, with selling hospitality, building hospitality in an inflationary environment. I think we've been able to work with Brandon's team to really reach out to the promoters and further enhance those relationships and help the negotiations. Say, "Okay, here's what we're seeing as a promoter. Here's how we think we can get to a better deal with you." I think we've been able to really employ that for the benefit of everyone who's been renewing this year.
The other thing I would add to that is Brandon and I have been working a lot around sponsorship. There's a great halo effect of Vegas to global and global to Vegas. Now we're also looking to share some of those opportunities with our local promoters, by bringing them into the deals. It's benefiting us, it's benefiting them.
I also think it creates, sort of back to, pardon, your question about places where we can put our capital. Where we're not necessarily gonna be the promoter, but maybe we have a role where we're investing alongside. I think there's a role for us in hospitality in a bigger way. I think you'll see us do things around that, where we can be synergistic and we can be helpful to the other promoters. I think you'll see us look for those kind of ancillary opportunities around the track, around the business that are attractive and high return, which are beneficial to us and to the other promoters.
Not that you all need more teams, but, you know, I think there's a lot of demand, Porsche comes to mind. The fee right now is $200 million. I don't think the teams are very interested at $200 million. You know, under the Concorde Agreement, where does that need to get to get teams interested? As I recall, you guys don't share in that fee, so you're just trying to do what's best for the.
Always, Jeff. Always.
Yeah, of course.
Well, actually, I think as you know, the process of having another team has been laun`ched by the FIA. In our governance, our Concorde, that's the best way to do it, but the evaluation is it has to be done together to see, you know, from the technical perspective, from the sporting perspective, for the financial stability and to make the bigger picture, if a new team will give value to the league, to the sport. They will be at a different position. I go back to one point that was said at the beginning. The figure that we're seeing as the so-called anti-dilution payment was done at $200 million just couple of years ago. Couple means two years ago.
At that time, you know, no one would have expected that the value of this business would have rise up so much. Today, the situation is totally different for sure, and it's our duty to make sure that we protect the business the best way that we can and have a bigger picture. You know, today there are so many that would like to come. There are teams that are more vocal than others, some other are much more silent, but they are really expressing their interest. As always in life, there's someone has to make that evaluation, and we are part of this process, and we're gonna do the right thing at the appropriate time during this year.
I just had one follow-up about actually the racing this year. I mean, realizing it's still pretty early. I mean, Red Bull is dominant, specifically in the DRS zones. You've had some people tend to complain, but, you know, maybe they actually aren't pushing as hard as they can because their setup is so much better than everybody else. You know, is that something the FIA kind of reviews? Do you feel confident that the competition can come up with packages to compete or, you know, are we gonna see Red Bull run away with it all again this year?
Well, let me comment on this point, in a quite detailed format. Of course, first of all, if there's a team that's faster than the others, congratulations. They did a better job than the others. It's the duty of FIA as the regulator to make sure that they check the compliance of the car with the regulation. If you look at the others of the bunch, of the other teams are very close. Very, very close. I'm very confident that with the budget cap, this situation will evolve in the best way for the better competition. On the other hand, there is one thing that I was just discussing in my table during lunch.
You know, what is interesting to see in the new markets when the new audience is coming in, that is not a real important factor. It's more in the, let's say, for the avid fans, that if you see a car that is dominant, they're creating a level of less interest. For the new market, for the new fans that are coming to the business, this is not really very important. For us, it's important because we want to make sure there is a great competition in the ecosystem. I would say, if I look today in the market where we are growing, this factor is not so relevant as you think. This is, in a way, very interesting to share, but that's the truth.
I would say, you said one thing that is important, is too early or too premature. For sure, we see the first three races, Red Bull was very, very competitive. I'm expecting the other to catch up. We need to wait and see the effect of the penalty that they had last year with the wind tunnel reduction. The championship is very long. I think we're gonna have good surprises before the end.
If I could just add, you know, the history of Formula 1 is that there have been teams that had a run. Red Bull had a run, Mercedes had a long run. You look behind that, we're actually seeing more overtaking and more competition than ever. There is... I think we can look statistically, there has been more overtaking this year than in prior years, and I think you'll see more of that. There is excitement on the track. As rightly as Stefano points out, it's three races. We'll see how the year goes.
Thanks. I guess two questions, probably for Greg. One is on capital allocation. You know, you're at very un-liberty-like leverage levels at F1, as you know, and continuing to come down. One question we get a lot-
Interest rates are up.
Yeah, I heard. Investors, it's just, you know, any use of capital is. You have such a high multiple asset in F1 that it's like a little bit of the winner's curse, right? Anything you buy or invest in may be less attractive in the eyes of the market. I'm just wondering if you think about that as you think about the opportunities to put capital to work. Then I wanted to ask you about media rights.
No, it's a fair point. I mean, I back to this, you know, the winner's success. We have a very high multiple asset. I think that multiple's probably merited.
Agreed
...you know, this is a business. We start out the year borrowing COVID, like events. We start out the year with 95% of our revenue locked down. Maybe there's a go get on 5%-10% at most. Again, put it on branded. Sponsorship's probably the big variable, right? There's some upside in some races, but most of them we're contracted. Vegas will be an upside race, but a lot of them are contracted. You know, so we have a reason as to why they should have a very low WACC. It's a very secure business. You know, lots of tailwind, all good. We think we will find synergistic assets around. Hopefully, we can convince you, Ben representing Mr. Market, that.
Jason's not here.
That we're, you know, we're doing something that's smart when thoughtful with that. So far, you know, the biggest thing we've done with the capital is put it over there in the ground. I think hopefully you all having toured it will agree that looks like a useful investment. I do think there are... Hospitality is one area. Trying to build packaging around that is an area I think we could be synergistic. I think there are, you know, other motorsport assets that we've looked at in the past that we'll get opportunities on that will be synergistic. We will try and find smart things to do.
If we take a flyer in the sense that it's not obviously, you know, in the wheelhouse, I hope we'll convince you that, look, our track record is meritorious, that you've got to give us the benefit of the doubt that we're playing for the long haul and it's beneficial.
That makes sense. Just on media rights, you know, it's obviously a big topic these days for a variety of reasons. Any, I don't know, concern on your part or any opportunity you wanna take to dampen expectations around what everyone just sees as this, like, up and to the right media rights environment? You look at the Disneys of the world and what they're doing, the year of efficiency at every tech company. Should we be thinking about a fundamentally different environment for a while than what we've seen over the last five years?
It is a great question. You've got, you know, two curves running, right? The traditional linear players who are all talking about cutting where they're spending. My good friend Zaz talking about how he's not, you know, what he's gonna do with his RSNs and what he's gonna do on basketball. You have obviously digital players rising up. When do those curves cross and be meaningful? We'll see. We have an enormous benefit. We are not getting that much money by the scale of these things, right? Forget the NFL, forget baseball, forget basketball. We are way down the curve. We were able to get enormous pop in the U.S. because we started out at such a low number. A negative perhaps is we're not a massive tonnage sport. But in a way, that's a positive.
They can say, these are, You know, I was listening to Stefano describe how we're gonna create amazing experiences at each of these races. Base used to call it each one is a Super Bowl, and our opportunity to make each of them tentpole events is good for some of those broadcasters. We may not be the 162 games that my friend, the Braves, are playing, but we're a different kind of success that could be meaningful, and it's not so much money. There is these two trends running. The positive is we're starting off a low base with a rising demand and demographics which look great compared to a lot of other sports.
you know, I can't tell you with certainty that all plays to the positive, but when I weigh the wins or the negative and the positive, I feel pretty good.
A question for Stefano. Obviously, you know, I think you need team permission to go above 24 races.
25?
Over 25.
Over 25. You know, we don't obviously know what the calendar is for next year, and we all trying to think about the growth curve. Is it and I think one of your interviews you've talked about like 32? Should we be thinking about this actually gonna be in 30+ markets?
No.
in five, 10 years?
No. Negative.
Okay.
For many reasons. I would say there's no secret that next year the objective is to have 24 races. That comment was just related to the fact that we are in a situation that had never happened before. Once again, I started to look always behind, not to forget anything. Just a couple of years ago, we were organizing 15 races, 15. Some of them in the old world were paid to have them a number of race to have a world championship. Now to see the interest that is growing so much is just a great asset to make sure that we maximize the, of course, the financial perspective, but also the qualitative performance of each promoter.
It's up to us to understand what is the best strategic development in term of new opportunities that may develop in the future to have eventually a rotational base for certain Grand Prix that are ready to discuss about it, to invest even stronger with the ones that we believe that could create a great step in term of our business growth, like in U.S., for example.
Stefano, perhaps towards that end, you can talk about, look, we have a calendar, some of which has historical reasons, gotten to 24. It does drain people, and there's a lot of travel. You might wanna talk about how you're trying to optimize, yeah, some of those races for efficiency. Go ahead.
We try. Of course, every single promoter has some reason to have a certain weekend, a certain opportunity. Now we try to make sure that in the years after year, we have a quite linear approach as much as we can in order to minimize the movement. Because, of course, you know, we have a very ambitious target with our carbon neutrality in 2030. That is a big effect. You know, we are a world championship. We are not doing that in one single region. We're moving all around the world. We take that very seriously. We're gonna try to be as much as effective as we can in order to minimize the ups and downs from different region, different countries.
Of course, knowing that we cannot have, for example, you know, four races in a row in the same continent because we're gonna have a problem, commercially and for other reasons, so. For sure, there is a lot of attention in this subject in order to develop, you know, the calendar in the best way that we can.
Greg, you mentioned Brandon and sponsorship a number of times. I don't know if maybe that's an opportunity to ask him about where he sees the opportunity. You mentioned the U.S.
Right.
Maybe there's other verticals, other regions where you see F1 is under-penetrated.
Yeah. I mean, clearly we see a big opportunity in, I'll call it the region, right? North American region. If you, from my perspective, I look at not only the three races we have in the U.S., you have Canada, you have Mexico, you even have Brazil. From a time zone perspective, that works very well for regionalization opportunities. We're really exploring that area of how can we find big, large scale brand partners that might just wanna focus on certain regions before they go to a global position. We're gonna leverage technology to bring them into the market. You know, you're probably aware that there's companies like Supernova and others out there that work across other sports.
Our ability to sort of put virtual branding into every race, but only seen in certain regions, allows us to begin to break things up in a way that we can monetize a region very specifically, right? Every race coming into the market can have a brand, but only seen in that region, right? We can begin to then look at regional opportunities. There's categories like, you know, telecommunications. Tough to find a global partner in telecom, right, because it's so regionalized as a business. You can begin to break that up and monetize it and collectively put that together in ways by having technology provide a benefit. We're really spending a lot of time on exploring that. We work together very closely with Renee on how that will build across the U.S. and into the region.
You'll start to see a lot of that from us as we think about not only global opportunities, but how we regionalize in such a way that we can scale. If that helps.
You know, perhaps worth commenting also. Look, historically, this was sold as paint on the track and the opportunity to sell not only regionally, but to sell on eyeballs, to sell on the digital presence, to sell a very different kind of experience, partly around activation. Our sponsorship opportunities are growing because we're getting a lot smarter and offering them a lot more in differentiated ways. I don't know, Brandon, if you wanna add anything on that.
Yeah, I can add one other thing, which is traditionally this is a business that is just sold on how much track you have and how many positions can I have on a track, right? It is not sold on the quality of the exposure, the quality of what you're seeing on TV. It's just been like, "Hey, here's some square meters we're gonna sell you on a per square meter basis." We're evolving that entire model to be much more about the quality of the exposure because we control the cameras, we control the broadcast. We know where we're pointing the cameras. We know the quality of every corner, the quality of every bridge. We can put LED rotationals, those types of things that allow us to then go to the market and say, "Hey, look, it's not about how many positions you have on the track.
It's about the quality of that position and of the exposure that you're gonna get in return. That opens up a whole more, a big world of opportunity that we can use the track for beyond just being stuck into this ecosystem of, well, we only have so many square meters that we can actually monetize.
One of the reasons to work with our promotion partners is, look, one of the things that big sponsors, take an Amex, want is That exposure. They want activation, they want on-site experience, and our opportunity to build those. You've seen. Good, I'm getting Brandon fired up.
Just we don't have Amex as a partner right now, just so we all know here.
The Amex people.
Yes.
They want to have, you know, they wanna have on-site activation, which is exciting. Seeing us now do things. We're building our own garage. You can go have an experience in that garage. We're doing things to create. Our sponsorship opportunities are not just how many feet track. A widely different experience now and something we can monetize. It's one of the reasons why we should be bullish. We are bullish on our sponsorship.
The opportunity that we give to them is not only the traditional TV. I mean, now with social media, with the other product like Nexus, we're gonna have a movie. In term of quality and quantity for our partners, the opportunity are getting bigger and bigger. That's why, to be honest, the inventory has never been so full, and that's really, once again, this will push us-
And that's why-
to be more creative in our offering.
That's why thinking that 24 races is a limitation is missing, that there's just ways we can grow our inventory in a very different way, make it more valuable than just saying, "Hey, you got 25 races or 23 races versus 24.
We're not selling a per race basis. Obviously, there are some times that that makes sense for a brand. But it's much more about what's the exposure and what can we bring to them as from an experience perspective. I mean, the B2B side of this of just what we can do within our hospitality and paddock and the ability to be a partner of that position without even being on the track is already, you know, very interesting for brands who live in that B2B space, who need the customer side of things, right? There's ways that you can build this that aren't just about what brand is on the track. We see a tremendous amount of upside on that.
That's not the way this business was sold five years ago. That's not the way this was done before. Real change.
Chris?
Actually just following up on that, when you look at, you know, entities like Manchester United, they have, you know, 50 sponsors. I'm just curious, how do you view the path to maximizing value? Is it having, you know, 50 sponsors? Do you think you make more by having seven or eight very high value, high paying like, kind of global sponsors? How do you guys think that math is maximized? And then.
Let me just start with saying, look, I think Man U's done an amazing job. We are selling a differentiated, frankly, higher end experience. There probably are limits on how many global partners we're gonna have, you know. The existing global partners, look how many are you elbowing around. We're trying to play that careful balance. We have a premium product. We wanna remain a premium product. There is a balance on how we're gonna do it. Man U is probably unbelievably good job. It's a little different, just in how much you wanna max and how you wanna play that game.
Sorry. The second part of that question was gonna be.
Well, I'm gonna be honest with you, Brandon. It'll be way more articulate and more exciting.
No, I think that's, I think that's accurate. We believe more, a little bit more in the, I'll call it the IOC FIFA structure for us based on the way we have our product built than how many logos can I stick on a jersey, right?
There's a lot of value and opportunity in putting sort of a smaller amount of global opportunities together that when you go to market, what you can pull out of the market in a very competitive environment than just going back every two years saying, "Well, now I've got this sleeve available, now I've got this sleeve available, and I've got the training kit available." By going in and saying we're sort of, I don't wanna say restricted, but very careful on how many global partners we add, I think we can, we can extract a tremendous amount of value from that position every time we go back to the market.
Is there any kind of, you know, you were just saying the way you sell this differently, it's not about, you know, paint and real estate. Is there a limiting factor other than just scarcity you're trying to create, or are there other kind of more physical or practical mitigants to how much you can sell?
I can answer to that. I would say that the limiting factor is the quality of our proposition. You know, global partners that we have today with us, you know, requires a lot of attention. They have invested a lot with us. Of course, the dilution of the quality of the branding is a very important factor that we need to protect. I mean, with all respect to Manchester United or other teams, I mean, I do remember very well who are the partners of us. By the way, once again, looking back, we had only four just four years ago, now we have 10. It's a big step. It's a big number. All the others are question of the value of...
I don't want to dispute about the other sports, but I think that our strategy is very clear, and we give the right value to the ones that are investing with us, bigger brands, big investment, and we have the duty to maximize the visibility and the quality of our partnership with them.
There are clearly, you know, we give exclusivity in areas, right? We have one watchmaker. We have one, you know, beer maker. I mean, we don't, you know, we're not putting multiples on there. There are practical limitations around that as well.
Charles.
Charles gets his first before Ben gets his second.
Hey. Greg, you had mentioned the tracking stock structure of Formula 1 earlier. I was curious, just given there's some other changes going on at Liberty in terms of Liberty Live and the Braves split-
We never wanna make it dull for you, Charles, don't worry.
When you think about where are we in the life cycle of Formula 1 as a tracker versus a hard C-corp, how do you think about that?
Yeah, I don't think it's front and center in our mind. No plan or intent, as they would say. I don't think the valuation is hurting by sitting being a tracking stock today, right? You know, last time I looked, everyone else in the space is looking, saying, "I wish I had that multiple." It's hard to look and say that we're suffering because of it, and I do think we have flexibility. You've seen some of that. The fact that we were able to move the Live Nation stock out showed the benefit of the tracking stock structure because once, you know, if we had. Remember, that was basically the SPAC asset we merged to get our way into the thing, and we were able then get it clean and be perfect, right?
That tracking stock structure turned out to be pretty good for getting the asset and then getting cleanliness for the asset. We wouldn't have been able to do that without the tracking stock structure. We pre-SPACs before SPACs were cool. I think it's working. Again, I just remind you, we got to this place in a pretty. Wait your turn for the question. You know, I think the tracking stock structure is being validated here. I don't see it as an impediment.
Ben.
Curious, Renee, just could you talk a little about staffing up your organization, kind of where you are in that process? I don't know if you're able to share any numbers of headcount of where you think you'll top out at, and then what is the permanent year-round footprint for Liberty from a headcount point of view? I was just curious for the whole panel, what can you tell us about this movie? I mean, are you involved in this movie?
Not much.
Is this a big deal for the business? Like, is this gonna be a massive marketing event, or is this a movie that Tom Cruise gets to make because he's Tom Cruise, and we'll see what happens. Anyway.
Brad Pitt.
Isn't Tom an exec producer? Scott Glass is not involved? No? Oh, okay.
It's the same people who made Top Gun. That's why Tom Cruise's name keeps coming up.
It's like he's getting paid somehow.
Probably in some way. I guess so first on the Vegas operations, we started out with four employees last Memorial Day in a complimentary Wynn suite here on the golf course. Very kind of Brian Gullbrants to give us a home when we had none. Then since then, we've staffed up to about 45 people here in Las Vegas. We have a handful of event operations who commute in. They're sort of nomadic by nature, the event op team. They'll commute in when needed. I'd say we're probably pretty much at headcount in terms of year-round activation of that office space. We're obviously putting a lot of time and resources in from Liberty. A lot of my colleagues at Liberty are here with me in the audience, working on finance and legal.
This has truly been a complete partnership between us and F1 to get this off the ground. I would expect 50 people year-round, boots on the ground here, and we may bring in some additional help with regards to the year-round activation of the pit building. We have not fully baked the strategy. It's something we really need to get moving on. Obviously the race is first and foremost in our minds.
Yeah, just to emphasize just on the personnel, I mean, you know, Renee does have a theoretical day job at Liberty as well.
It's not theoretical.
As, as we said, good thing we haven't done as many deals, so we haven't had to use that part of her. No, you know, so e . What are you spending? What percent of your time is being spent on Las Vegas? Yeah. So we've seconded assets from Liberty to do this. As I think rightly as Stefano or Renee would point out, this is a real partnership between Liberty and F1, and it's different than most of the things we've done.
I think, Renee, maybe just talk also about what you've staffed up, you know, the capabilities you're building, different kind of tools you're putting in place, things that might be year one in nature.
Yeah, sure, Shane. I'd say the largest portion of our personnel is commercial. That includes our marketing group, which handles social media. They've done a tremendous job just around. We have over 2 million, 220 million imprints and 239,000 plus followers in a matter of, you know, a handful of months. Marketing team is doing a really terrific job. We have the sponsorship team, obviously working hand in glove with Brandon and the global team, to sell the sponsorship, to provide for those hospitality activations, to try to minimize those exclusivity categories, which probably are one of the biggest restrictions that we face. Obviously ticketing. We have a lot of tickets to sell. We have to organize them up.
We have to figure out what are the right hospitality places, what are the suites, who's going to fit and furnish them, who's going to provide the catering. We are obviously using the DO & CO for the Paddock Club, but there's a lot more mouths to feed around the circuit than just in the Paddock Club. On the event operation side, they're responsible for procuring the grandstands and the suites and building the structures out. Wayfinding is extremely important to us. I mean, a year one venture is really putting together the app and, you know, knock on wood, our app is gonna blow the rest of them away. It's going to have completely interactive, click where I am, how do I walk to where I need to go, is there a shuttle available?
These are all year one, costs and investments in terms of the technology and the personnel to get it right. Obviously, we will continue to build on that year after year. Communication and messaging, instructional volunteers, it's all part of the year one effort.
Movie.
Movie.
Jerry Bruckheimer is the producer, Joseph Kosinski, the director. That's another way to show what we want to do, something different. I mean, once again, when we start the collaboration with Netflix, the community will say, 'What's going on? This is not our place to be.' Now we understand the power of it. Then we added the, you know, the very strong presence with social media, making sure that all our drivers, teams are very active in promoting the sport. That's another tool with the movie that's gonna be produced. Actually, we're gonna start the shooting in Silverstone very soon. You will see, will be the first movie when basically they will be within the, the racing event. Will be quite invasive in term of production.
It's something that we need to control in a way, but will be another way of showing the Formula 1 never stop.
Yes.
In term of,
Yes. Yes. Look, I think to Stefano's point, and I again go back to Chase, you know. The Simpsons has gone for 20 years, but there aren't that many shows. These, these Fox guys, cognizant. There aren't that many shows that run that long. Drive to Survive is wonderful, but we cannot rely on Drive to Survive to be our only promotion vehicle forever. You've got to keep it fresh, change the game. That's one of the things I'd like to think we've done with the team entering Formula 1. Credit Stefano. What we've done more recently around other kinds of Instagram and TikTok and the like, we're, you know, keeping it fresh and different. This movie, kind of like Vegas, is gonna be a whole another level.
As much as Drive to Survive is enormous to a lot of people in this room and a lot of people around the world, I still go places and people say, "Huh?" You know, its audience is not that big. It may be big among this group, but it's not that big. A Brad Pitt movie, with you know, Lewis Hamilton consulting and with Bruckheimer and with the director from Top Gun: Maverick. You know, we've already seen some of what they're gonna do and how they're gonna skin these cars and what they're gonna... They took the technology from Top Gun. It's gonna be amazing. I do not have a role as of yet.
There'll be a cameo.
I did. Yeah, you saw my cameos in DTS. They made a huge difference. I did sit between Lewis Hamilton and Brad Pitt at one dinner, you know, I was planting the seed.
Yep.
Yeah.
I had a question about the how to think about the TV audience for the Vegas race, given the timing. I mean, it's gonna be 1:00 A.M. East Coast, and what, how material is that audience kind of consideration for the business?
I will tell you, the 10:00 P.M. start time was very much a negotiated compromise. It was very important to us that we allow it to be at a time where our legacy fans in Europe will be able to watch it with a cup of coffee, as many of us do here for the European races. It's not that different from, you know, think about boxing matches that start here in Las Vegas and are, you know, broadcast in New York. People stay up to watch Saturday Night Live and all kinds of events. Although not ideal for the East Coast, it definitely works for the West Coast. It works for other local stakeholders. They did not want us doing it even later.
They were worried about noise, and they were under the misconception there will be people in town who don't wanna be at F1. They've now gotten over that misconception. In the early days, they weren't so confident. If we went earlier at 8:00 P.M., you're just foreclosing the European market. We did not think that that would be the right thing to do for those legacy fans.
This is the challenge of being a global sport, right? We do have fans all around the world, but also answering to our, our partners here, our casino and hotel partners. They're very ecstatic about the idea that people are gonna be sitting, drinking for several hours, watch the race for several hours, then go gamble. They're gonna be very effective at the blackjack tables then.
Maybe just one for Greg and Stefano. We're starting to think more about the Concorde Agreement, you know, coming up over the next couple of years here. Just wondering if you could maybe talk a little bit about what value you feel like you're bringing to the table this time around that you didn't have last time. As you look forward, there's some key items that you think you want to include or wanna negotiate for in the next round. Perhaps just the timing around this all.
Let me say that first of all, we just signed a new Concorde Agreement. As always, we are looking to be very quick, and that is a good point. I would say today, the balance of what is on the table is, I would say, very important for the ecosystem. I mean, just if you think back, I mean, more than two, less than five teams were asking loans to Formula 1 to be alive and to survive and to make sure that we're participating to the Grand Prix. Today, with the things that we've done, the system is very healthy, sustainable financially, and this is giving value to our business. That's already something that has been recognized by all the teams. At the appropriate time, I think we're gonna sit around the table.
The teams will understand what we brought to them, and we will understand what we believe will be the right strategy to tackle that. I would say that could happen sooner or later, but we just signed, you know, the new one. We need to be, we need to prepare that in the best way that we can, knowing that the element we put in place are the right one. That's for sure.
For what it's worth, you know, you're all there's only these people in the room. No one's listening on the web. Stefano and I were talking about this morning, what we might want and when to go. Look, we think it is in everybody's interest, the teams and ours and the FIA's, to solidify the success we collectively have had and show the world that we're together moving forward. I expect this will not... Yeah, putting us, myself at risk as always, but I don't think this is gonna go to the end the way have prior ones have done.
Time for one more from the room. Jeff.
One of the ways you've improved the health of F1 for the teams is to institute effectively cost controls. How has the cost cap on relative expectation... You mentioned earlier that Red Bull penalized, do you think differently about the cost cap if you have more sprint races 'cause there's a greater chance for accidents? Is there flexibility around-
Well, first of all, I think that what has been done has been phenomenal for the sport. Is now given for granted that, you know, those have been a success. I think that if I take a very high view, the problem we faced for the first year of application were very, very small in comparison of the complexity. Now we are adding another dimension because up to yesterday there was the sporting, the technical dimension where the teams were focused on and also the FIA as the regulator was focused on. We added the financial one, maybe the most complicated one, because in term of policing, you know, the fiscality is different from country to country.
The complexity of the details, there are teams that are part of the manufacturer and there are other entities that are building up to create, you know, some resources for the team. The complexity is for sure something that FIA has to be very strong in building up a team that is really very good in managing the control. I think that what has been done is one of the pillar that's enabling the system to be so strong. That has, of course, put the teams in a different cultural frame because now they need to think differently. How to manage the development of the year. We were talking about sprint. That could be another effect that, you know, you can have more accident or crashes and so on. That's part of the game.
They need to control in a different way. That's better for the unpredictability of the sport. That's something that has been very difficult to put in the heads of the old people that were in Formula 1 since the beginning. I think it is crucial in the medium term to have it, because that will enable also the sport, going back to your first point, to have more competition on the track.
I'll close by saying, you know, when we took over, we really had four goals with the new Concorde Agreement. Create more on-track parity through putting a hard cap in, putting in a less steeply graded payout to the team so that the bottom teams had a better chance to make more money. We had put in a new series of designs which allowed more overtaking, and we made the teams franchises so that the 10 had value. Remember back to the point earlier about the $200, Manor was the 11th team, and just before we bought into Formula 1, it went into administration in the U.K. and got sold for GBP 1 . The world has changed dramatically. Have we achieved everything on our goals?
We have achieved an awful lot about bringing parity and about bringing the ecosystem to be healthy and about generating interest. The number of people who call and want to invest in a team, you know, we could fill this room and more. Our goal is to build a long-term healthy ecosystem and build a sport that has as much of some of the elements that the NFL has on any given Sunday, that anybody can win. They compete like hell on Sunday and then think about the league first on Monday. Stefano mentioned we were at the sporting conference, and the two of us had lunch with Adam Silver and Roger Goodell. Interesting to compare where we are, what advantages we have as a league, what disadvantages, and they're not unique. We had only 24 races.
We don't have the tonnage. We do have international. We've brought in a lot of parity. There are a lot of really important things that we can do. That's what we're gonna try and drive over the next five years and 10 years in this sport as much as possible, building competitiveness and make it fascinating for the team owners, for the fans, and for the general public.
With that.
Thank you.
Thank you all. We appreciate it.