Toyota to withdraw from F1
November 5, 2009 by Matt Brogan
Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) has announced over night that it plans to withdraw from the FIA Formula One World Championship (F1) at the end of the 2009 season.
TMC, which had viewed its participation in F1 as contributing to the prosperity of automotive culture, remained dedicated to competing at the pinnacle of motor sports, even in the face of the abrupt economic changes that started last year. However, when considering TMC’s motor-sports activities next year and beyond from a comprehensive midterm viewpoint reflecting the current severe economic realities, TMC decided to withdraw from F1.
TMC leaves F1 having compiled 13 podium and 87 point finishes over eight challenging seasons since 2002 with Panasonic Toyota Racing, a full-constructor team. It views its time in F1 – in which teams put forth their best efforts to fiercely compete at racing’s highest level – as an irreplaceable experience that provided an opportunity to develop both human resources and its R&D operations. TMC expresses its deepest appreciation to its F1 fans and others for their warm support.
Drawing on its experience in F1 and other motor sports, TMC intends to move forward in developing exciting production vehicles, such as the Lexus LFA supercar and compact rear-wheel-drive sports cars, the FT-86. In motor sports, it will not only race in various categories, but will also actively contribute to further development of motor sports by supporting grassroots races and planning events in which it is easy for people to participate.
Below is the speech from Toyota President, Mr Akio Toyoda, from the press conference:
Toyota has engaged in F1 racing for eight seasons, starting in two thousand two. But we will conclude our participation in F1 competition with this season.
Our board of directors reached that decision after debating the issue thoroughly. I want to express my heartfelt appreciation to everyone who has supported our F1 program over the past eight years.
That includes the fans who cheered for our team, the companies that sponsored our racing program, the journalists who covered our activities, and the drivers and all the other team members, who shared the excitement of automobiles with people worldwide through F1 racing.
I attended the Japanese Grand Prix last month at the Suzuka Circuit. The passion of the fans was infectious. The team play displayed by our F1 team, Panasonic Toyota Racing, was incredibly impressive, and our driver’s performance was genuinely stunning.
When I think of the fans, emotions well up inside me. All I can hope is that people will understand that this painful decision was unavoidable in view of the present business environment and the medium- and long-range outlook. Our fans have been calling on us to really go at it next year. And I offer my sincere apologies that we will be unable to fulfill their expectations.
The Toyota F1 team has competed in one hundred forty F1 races over the past eight years. It has tackled each race with intensity and has honed its competitiveness continuously.
I salute the Toyota team for performing impressively in head-to-head competition with the greatest names in motor sports. And I thank the members of our team for sharing with us their passion and their vision.
I have been calling for product-focused management since I became president at Toyota this June. I have called for Toyota to concentrate on serving customers one at a time with flavorful vehicles that make them happy.
That priority mandates a fundamental shift in resource allocation. A sad result of that shift is that we have insufficient resources to maintain a viable commitment to F1 racing.
Economic and market conditions remain extremely trying. But adversity only heightens the importance of rethinking our proper legacy for the next generation.
A commitment to contributing to society through the manufacture of automobiles has steered all activity at Toyota since the company’s beginning. Today, we are undertaking several initiatives to promote the development of automotive culture on a new and higher plane.
Motor sports remain an important means of personalising the automobile in the eyes of customers. Motor sports also remain an important means of cultivating human resources and our R&D operations.
We will rethink our motor-sports activities with an eye to maximising those benefits while addressing economic realities. And we will take what we learn on the racetrack and put it to work in ever-better vehicles that are aimed at meeting the highest of expectations.
Thank you.
Print it: 
It was bound to happen.
I think, they got in, did their research, struggled, experienced some bright spots, but in the end. When they had enough experience (engine development/data collection), and amidst to recovering profit lost. It was bound to happen… Toyota follows Honda out.
Toyota/Lexus exits with a new V10 engine, new sports cars from it…. in the end, you knew the F1 stint was for primary development of technology, competition secondary. Toyota makes their $$$ from sales, not marketing advertisements.
“..in the end, you knew the F1 stint was for primary development of technology, competition secondary.Toyota makes their $$$ from sales, not marketing advertisements.”
You don’t work in the Toyota marketing department do you? – that’s the typical spin we have come to expect from TMC.
Its better to be a big fish in a small pond than a small fish in a big pond.
No I dont, I work in the automotive industry however.
When I said Toyota doesnt make $$$ in advertisements/marketing.. I meant that on the F1 vehicles, where sponsors pay $$$ for advertisement spots.
Other constructors/teams are in the races due to sponsorship funding along with deep pockets of owners etc. Team Toyota’s funds are off the Toyota profits.
And knowing that Profits have been severely hit by the recession. It was bound to happen that they pull out.
That may be however; less than 6 months ago Toyota said that they were committed to F1 for the next 5 years.
Volkswagen have shown that you don’t need to compete in F1 to develop your product let alone your engines etc.
Over the 8 years that Toyota have spent being an also ran in F1 Volkswagen have increased the power of their engines not to mention the fuel efficiency whilst making them smaller in size weight and capacity.. which improves the handling performance of their cars..
Absolutely, this is why VW will be the worlds largest automotive manufacturer in the world before their target of 2018
I’d hate to imagine just how much $$$ was poured into the F1 program.
If you at first don’t succeed, give up like a Nancy and blame the GFC
Says someone who doesnt spend a cent on running a F1 racing team.
I’m sure if YOU funded the team, Toyota will stay.
Honda pulled out for the same reason.
Someone should outlay the spenditures of an F1 team each season. Tyres alone is in the $5 Million+ per season.
Please! You’ve got to be kissing right? Spoken like a true Toyota patsy. Pull the smoke and mirror routine over others. Toyota has more money than any other Auto manufacturer in the world. What other forms of motorsport do they compete in? They are quitters because they couldnt win period!!!
And what sports cars came out of their F1 program? None! The connection between the V10, the Lexus fugly-mobile and their F1 program is about as relevant as Ferrari’s are to Hyundai.
Take your pathetic retoric elsewhere.
To be fair aj, F1 is really more a show then a direct connection to road cars, which Ferrari in recent years has directly benefited from their involvement in F1? I think that Toyota’s withdraw is hardly surprising given the high cost and lack of victory, but i don’t think it’s valid to say F1 racing should breed sports cars. Remember Ferrari’s claim of ‘F1′ gearbox? No connection to an actual ‘F1 gearbox’, and the engines used by F1 are far removed from anything road going since the end of the turbo era.
The average team spends around 200 Million per season
oh and that’s in Euro’s
The F1 teams use 16 people to do a pit stop whilst the V8 Supercar teams can do a pit stop just as quickly with 1/2 as many people..
Therefore; there are at least 8 people which each F1 team can get rid of which would help reduce costs – just an idea
C’mon Toyota, back to the WRC where you belong!!
Surprising that Toyota would pull out after having the best and most promising season in F1 to date.
They should have stayed for atleast one more year and had Koybayashi drive for them. He is already being hailed as the next “Sato”. Would have done Toyota a world of good in terms of marketing. He is already a hit with the fans and the Japanese public would have loved him.
With cost in F1 coming down it is surprising that teams decide to leave now.
Kobayashi’s driving was impressive hopefully he can get a spot on another team. He is worth giving a go especially if your a team like Force India.
Not really a surprise, they’ve spent more then any team over the last 8 seasons without ever looking like getting a single win.
I wont miss them they didn’t bring much to the sport apart from cubic dollars.
You can’t run a race team by committee it made them to slow & cumbersome to adapt.
I heard once that it costs around $500 million to develop an F1 car. Now I can’t remember for certain if that was R&D only or included running the car and team for the year, or even if it was the cost of one or both of the cars. I have a feeling though that that figure didn’t include the running costs and moving the teams all around the world etc.
No matter which way you look at it but that’s a lot of money, especially considering that’s the cost per year. Add in the initial layouts to get into the sport and the costs to get out, and it’s been a very expensive venture for Toyota, especially considering their rather lackluster performance.
toyota have pulled out (like honda) because the results weren’t there. 8 years and not one victory, despite the huge amounts of money that they put in.
to say that toyota’s involvement was just for the technical developement is misguided and naive. toyota were in it, just like all the other teams, as a way to increase their brand. 8 years of not winning wasn’t helping their brand at all. on the contrary, people were more likely to think that toyota (the F1 team) were rubbish and that doesn’t help anything.
the simple fact is that if toyota were winning (and not just almost winning) they’d still be racing. can you imaging the marketing power they’d have if they were F1 winners? and do you really think they’d throw that away for a few hundred mill? remember, this is the company that shouted to the world (or australia at least) of the O2 advantage (the camry used oxygen!) and independant front suspension for the “wide body camry” a while back.
hear hear.
Agree with you there, most likely the same reason for Honda and BMW’s withdraw as well. I guess if the GFC didn’t happen, they might stick in it a bit more, but with GFC and the environmental issue, car manufacturers are shifting their attention away from F1.
Also not forget that F1 is a difficult sport for new entrants to break into. Except for Brawn, F1 has being dominated by 4 teams in the last 30 years. Ferrari, McLaren, Williams and to a lesser extent Renault (Benetton). Brawn and Red Bull’s dominance this year is a welcome change to that pattern, but I suspect that next year things will be same old same old again. Doubt any of the new start teams will make an impact either, most likely just filling up the grid and be happy to finish the races.
On another note, although starting with a new start team, I’m eager to see how Senna will perform, Ayrton back in the days highly praised his nephew Bruno Senna.
Wonder if Renault will pull out as well, apparently a meeting is being to decide on their future. If Renault pull out as well, this will leave Ferrari/Mercedes/Cosworth as the only engine suppliers, ending the era of factory team F1s. In some ways, I’m happy for these manufacturers to pull out and see F1 return to being less commercialised. Of course with old man Bernie, F1 will never truly return to be less commercialised.
Also Brigestone is pulling out too in 2010, interesting time ahead in F1. If Renault does pull out, my prediction for next year is back to the McLaren/Ferrari two horse race, with Red Bull and Brawn possbile contenders. The rule change this year really shaked up the establishment, but with the budget of McLaren/Ferrari, i’m sure they’ll bounce back next year. Brawn had a good year, but let’s not forget the car was developed over two years with Honda money and the combined talent from Honda Racing and Super Aguri. Come next year, with limited budget, I doubt Brawn will be able to repeat their brilliant performance this year.
A new team will come along, buy the Toyota outfit, and win the world championship next year.
Why? Well – look at Honda – you got rid of the “Japanese” management style, and instant results followed.
The pattern is repeated in Mototcycle teams too – just go back over the history of Doohan – success only came when the management style was non-Japanese.
I doubt anyone buying Toyota will win next year. Brawn won this year not because of the management change, but more as a result of the rule change throwing the established rival off course. Not to mention that the Brawn cars this year were developed over nearly 2 season with the money of Honda and the combined talent of Honda Racing and Super Aguri, I seriously doubt they will be able to repeat the success of this year with other teams clearly catching up to them in the later races of this season after sorting out their car to the new rules.
And that’s not forget that despite being Japanese ‘owned’, both Honda and Toyota’s F1 teams are run mostly by Europeans based in Europe.
it wasn’t because of a management change that brawn won this year – it was because honda basically stopped any developement of their 2008 car to focus on this year’s car because of the major rule changes. if brawn was still being run and owned by the japanese, it still would have won. and extra 12 months of developement will do that…
it’s a similar reason why ferrari and mclaren did so poorly – they couldn’t stop developement of their 2008 car to focus on the 2009 car because they were fighting for the championship.
also, don’t forget the japanese, with whatever management style, were producing probably the best engine (admittedly a while back in the late 80s) in the honda units.
toyota’s failure is down to a number of other reasons – they never managed to find a top-tier driver and having their team essentially split between germany and japan didn’t help things.
No they won’t, rumour has it the U.S have a team ready to enter the 2010 season, theya re also rumoured to be buying out the Honda F1 team.
What do you mean? USF1 was already a confirmed starter before Toyota’s withdraw, unless you meant there’s another US team?. Honda F1 team buy out? Again, i’m baffled, Honda F1 team has already became Brawn for 2009 season…
Yes Rumour has it Brawn may not be financially viable for 2010 and sell out to a U.S consortium, but Eccleston doesn’t care who leaves, as long as a team has the money to join and replace them.
From a logistics perspective having F1 offices in both Japan and Cologne doesn’t seem right. And what about the long-term driver contracts, didn’t they serve the team well.. Ralph Schumacher and the ‘Trulli Train’ didn’t exactly pay big dividends.
Nakajima’s drive at Williams and Kobayashi’s role at Toyota proves the whole F1 adventure was little more than an expensive branding exercise. I think the execs at Toyota might also have let national pride get the better or them as well.
Cool,now Toyota can focus on Aussie racing cars.hehe
BMW X ; Honda X ; Toyota X ; Renault X ; In a couple of years F-1 will stand for Ferrari-1 as they will be the only ones left.. and could possibly be reduced down to 1 car.. So much for the pinnacle of motorsport
lol.. good call with the Ferrari 1 call….
Hopefully other manufacturers will see this as an opportunity to join in…well any car manufacturers that are profitable..
Can’t really blame the current manufacturer’s for pulling out when they’re losing money hand over fist.