Not sure if its true but it's big news if it is. The end of an era. Like if Enzo quit Ferrari! Ex-McLaren boss Dennis waves chequered flag with £275m stake sale Ron Dennis, the former boss of the McLaren automotive group, is to sever his decades-long ties with the company with the sale of his shareholding in a £275m deal. Sky News has learnt that Mr Dennis has agreed to offload his stakes in McLaren Technology Group, which controls the eponymous Formula One (F1) team, and McLaren Automotive Limited, the road car manufacturer. Sources said that the deal, which will be announced on Friday morning, will value McLaren at well over £2bn - making it one Britain's most valuable private companies.
I find that news very sad. Ron Dennis is the man who made McLaren what it is, and he has been let down by his associates. He was the man behind many successes, several championships and also the birth of a sports car company.
The investors "put him out to pasture" several month ago. Only the British could come up with the term "Gardening leave". LOL!
He will be a hard act to follow; none of the shareholders has a clue about managing a race team. It's a very sad news, and I fear McLaren will never recover and be in the winning circle again. Ron Dennis departure from McLaren is like the passing of Chapman for Team Lotus; you cannot replace these men, and their loss signal the decline of what they have achieved.
I am not absolving him of his mistakes, but throwing him out after he made the team and the company so successful is negating everything he achieved. He was the inspiration behind the team and the car company, not Ojjeh or the Bahrainis who never attended races or burnt midnight oil at the factory. I would not be surprised if McLaren is sold now, so that they can cash their chips. A very sad outcome for what was once a top team.
Yah... but I think Honda really let Ron down. Everyone on Fchat thought the McLaren Honda deal would make McLaren a powerhouse again when it was first announced. I don't believe it was his fault Honda was not up to the task.
Gardening leave! You have to be petty silly you think being replaced is one. That's poltics for you make it look less worse than it is. I consider being ousted as something else other than "Gardening leave" like being fired!
I agree. That he may not have been especially well liked, or even likable, does not diminish the magnitude of his achievement. He was a worthy bearer of Bruce McLaren's legacy. They were men with very different approaches, but the same kind of drive and passion. I think the sport is poorer for his departure.
I don't see what the big deal is. He brought this upon himself. He should have retired gracefully and peacefully long time ago, instead of coming back, brokering a horrible deal with Honda, and then get pushed out.
It's the inevitable grind of control exerted by stock market investors and their interference in companies they own over and above that of those on the board who are actually there. Ron wasn't the most friendly character if you didn't know him, but he was a fierce and clever competitor who knows how to win. Mclaren won't find his someone of his ilk easily to get them out of their current mess, nor prevent the next, Zak brown isn't 10% of what Ron was. I feel almost like I'm writing an open obitutary to mclaren here, so I won't go further
McLaren is privately owned. And, it only has about 600 employees. My guess is they wanted to get rid of Ron, clean up their books, and go public. I think their own people floated the rumor a few months ago about Apple buying them. Apple said it was a non started almost immediately and they never seriously considered it. They have pretty good product to sell. But I think Ron misunderstood just how difficult it would be to create passenger car company from scratch world wide. Most of the board arguments have been in the passenger car business. It's hard for me to believe they've made one red cent yet from selling cars in total. The P1 brought in a lot of cash but the rest I think have been money losers.
After the 2007 "Stepneygate" saga which resulted in Team McLaren being excluded from the 2007 WCC and a record-breaking US $100 Million fine - Bon Voyage Ron, the Ferrari community will not miss you.
I always found the fine completely disproportionate with the alleged offence. In an industry where teams poach engineers from each other all the time, what is the value of a bundle of papers? It was clearly Mosley wanting to destroy Ron Dennis behind that sanction; the 2 men never thought eye to eye since the 60s.
Well deserved. If he is to be praised for Mclaren's success he also needs to be criticised for its failures. The F1 team had become shambolic, his personality did not work with a new generation of employees and his conduct when it came to other shareholders meant that their trust in him had evaporated. It simply stopped working for him toward the end and he proved that he lacked the ability to fix it. He simply dug the hole deeper. Today, he's a 70 year old man that is now £275M richer and he can enjoy the rest of his life. C'est la vie.
People like Ron Dennis, whose way of dealing with issues is "my way or the highway", always face the same fate the day they meet a bigger fish. But it´s been a good ride. McLaren now is a lot bigger than any person so the show will go on without him.
He didn't broker a horrible deal with Honda, he cut a great deal. Who would have anticipated the Honda debacle? I don't recall anyone making that prediction at the time. +1 The Honda disaster and the road car company brought about his downfall. His unwillingness to sign a F1 title sponsor for reduced terms didn't help matters.
His career and his persona are not too dissimilar from Enzo Ferrari's own life, but FIAT had the good grace of leaving the Old Man alone when they took over, and kept him as a figurehead.
Hope he spends all his money trying to come back in F1 just to be even less successful than in his last mclaren years.
I agree that this is very likely. I also agree that if they would have gotten rid of him before the Honda deal was done they wouldn't be barely existing as they are now. They would be in much better shape, possibly both the F1 team and the road car division. Anyone in McLaren who was against the Honda deal surely has been absolutely infuriated blaming Dennis for all the McLaren misfortune of the past several years.
Because the Agnellis had culture and class....and a knowledge of business that transcended mere balance sheets. Sweater Boy would have kicked Enzo to the kerb without a thought....
