Gerard Lopez: Lotus have terminated sponsorship agreement – Formula 1 news
Lotus team owner, Gerard Lopez has said that all the sponsorship agreements with Group Lotus have been terminated.
“The sponsorship agreement and the obligations of Lotus have been terminated,” Lopez told Autosport.com. “There is no option from Group Lotus to buy into F1 now - that option was taken over by us. There was one, but we have taken it over now.”
It has been reported that Group Lotus is facing immense financial crisis which became the reason for the termination of the agreement. Nevertheless, the team will carry the name Lotus.
Furthermore, Lopez said that they are not under any kind of financial pressure due to the cessation of the agreement because they can get investment from Genii Capital. However, he admitted that there is a possibility to add the name of the new sponsor in
the current name of the team Lotus.
“We are happy to carry the Lotus name as we believe it is a good name for F1. We funded the team last year and the year before for whatever delta was missing. We would prefer to have sponsors up to the full amount - but if we have to fund it then we will
fund it,” he added.
Lotus have emerged as quite a competitive team this year with the comeback of Kimi Raikkonen who spent his last two years racing in the World Rally Championship.
The Finnish driver secured an impressive seventh place finish in the season opener held at Albert Park in Melbourne, Australia after starting from 17th position in the grid. Additionally, in the second race at Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia,
he secured a fifth place finish.
It will be interesting to mention that Eric Boullier, the team principal of Lotus said that they should not be viewed as a second class team anymore because they have the potential to fight with the top teams including McLaren, Red Bull Racing and Ferrari.
In addition, he admitted that they do not have the budgets like the big teams. Nonetheless, he said that the lack of funds is not an obstruction for them to strive for the victories.
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