http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/motorsport/article2059838.ece From CHARLIE WYETT Published: Today JENSON BUTTONS Honda team could be saved from Formula Ones scrapheap by a former taxi driver! Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim has emerged as the frontrunner to buy it after visiting the factory last week. Slim, 68, started out driving cabs before making a £55billion fortune from telecommunications. And that makes him the worlds second richest man behind American investor Warren Buffet. A Honda source said: His helicopter was too big for the heliport so they had to clear the car park for it to land. But his crest was on the side of it so everyone knew who it was. The Honda F1 team was put up for sale at a knock-down price this month by its Japanese parent company because of the crisis in the car industry. Former BAR boss David Richards was in the Middle East this weekend looking for backers to put up the £150million needed to run the team this year. And Force India chief Vijay Mallya has also expressed an interest along with a Swiss hedge fund and Greek shipping tycoon Achilleas Kallakis. But the Honda source added: A lot of people at the factory are worried about Richards or Mallya taking over. People think Mallya will just cherry-pick the best bits for Force India. And how can Richards say he wants to take over the team when he is asking the government for money for his Aston Martin company. Honda chief executive Nick Fry said: We have had a high level of interest in the team since Honda announced their withdrawal from Formula One. Work on the build of our 2009 car continues to ensure our objective of being on the grid at Melbourne in March will be achieved.
It appears that they already have...... Cabbie -> Telecom "mogul". Anyone know anything about this guy? Cheers, Ian
Hope he does buy Honda, Nearly 5,000 UK jobs at risk as Toyota reveals first EVER annual loss. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1099724/Toyota-reveals-EVER-annual-loss-world-tumbles-deeper-recession.html And I don't think Tata motors is any better off. Image Unavailable, Please Login
makes sense, one of his companies is Telmex which is already involved in racing. maybe this will be the leverage needed for getting a North American race back...in Mexico City!
The article is inaccurate. Carlos Slim was never a cab driver or had any humble origins. BTW he's net worth is (was?) $55b in $ and not £ He enherited from his father and turned himself into a very successful financier. During the early 90's he "acquired"/was assigned control the Mexican national phone company (monopoly) and after several moves and take overs became one the the richest men in the world. He's very savvy but clearly made his money the old way by dealing with goverment officials. He put up a site with his biography www.carlosslim.com/biografia_ing.html Slim is too good an investor to sink in money into F1. In today's markets he is buying stuff right and left. I'm sorry for Jenson but it's very unlikely that Honda F1 is one of them.
