Why Porsche’s Red Bull F1 plans appear dead in the water

There had been an original plan for a press announcement about the partnership to be made at the Austrian Grand Prix, and matters had progressed enough for Porsche to seek permission for a buy-in of the team with anti-cartel authorities.

But as fellow Volkswagen Group manufacturer Audi confirmed its entry from 2026 at the Belgian GP, the silence that emerged from the Porsche and Red Bull camps about their own plans hinted at there being some last minute bumps in the road.

And those obstacles now appear to have grown into solid brick walls, and point to any possibility of a joint F1 team venture between Red Bull and Porsche – which involved a sale of shares in the Milton Keynes F1 team – to be firmly off the table.

Red Bull motorsport advisor told website F1-Insider.com at Zandvoort quite definitively on Sunday night: “Porsche will not become a shareholder in us.”

Motorsport.com and sister website Motorsport-total.com has had it confirmed by several sources with good knowledge of the situation that Marko’s statement is the reality of the situation.

There will be no formal buy-in of the F1 team by Porsche as originally anticipated – and at best all that is available is a deal with Red Bull powertrains that could prompt a rebadging of the engines.

It is understood that behind the scenes at Porsche, there is great disappointment at the collapse of the deal. And also some debate about if the FIA’s approval of the engine regulations had been ratified earlier as originally planned, to open the door for the Austrian GP announcement, how different things could have been right now.

What appears to have happened in the wake of the rules delay – and the final tweaking of the 2026 regulations regarding new entrant concessions – is that Red Bull chiefs Christian Horner and Marko backed away from thinking that the 50/50 partnership with Porsche from 2026 was the best thing for the F1 squad.

Initially, it is understood that the negotiations were quite uncomplicated. But the longer the talks lasted, and the deeper they went into details of how things would work, the more Porsche managers sat at the table, and the greater the scepticism grew at the Milton Keynes camp.

For with Red Bull knowing it has star driver Max Verstappen, ace designer Adrian Newey, and a super sharp racing team and car, what would there be to gain by sacrificing any of that for more external influence…