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Formula 1 is first and foremost about speed – it’s what a team needs to win laps, to win races, and to win championships. Achieving the blinding pace required to lead the pack is more complex than one can imagine.
Behind the scenes, Formula 1 teams partner with a number of organizations to help them build, analyze, and manage their cars and technology.
In 2026, Formula 1’s governing body, the FIA, is introducing a new set of regulations which are set to shake up the sport, and the Mercedes-AMG F1 team has announced it will be leveraging SAP’s technology and intelligent enterprise solutions to help ease the transition into the new rule set and to ensure compliance in all areas. TechRadar Pro spoke to Micheal Taylor, IT Director at Mercedes-AMG F1 Team to find out more.
The 2026 regulations
The last few years have seen much debate from Formula 1 fans about the impact the incoming 2026 regulations could have on the grid – and amongst all the speculation, one thing is clear: these regulations are complex.
Mercedes-AMG hopes its work with SAP will help it prepare for the new regulations, as such complex rules require intense work to stay compliant.
“The likelihood is [these will be] sweeping regulation changes,” Taylor explains, “probably the largest set of regulation changes (all being introduced at the same time) the sport’s ever seen. That’s complexity for all teams, as you can imagine. It’s not only a technical change, there’s also sporting and financial related regulation changes as well.”
It’s important to note Formula 1’s financial regulations have become particularly important since a cost cap was introduced in 2021, with this spending limit slashing the budgets for top teams, but has overall helped to level the playing field for others.
These regulations come with penalties when they are violated – most Formula 1 fans will remember when the Red Bull team was handed a $7m fine and a 10% wind tunnel reduction penalty for its overspend of just $2.2m over the $145m limit in 2021.
More than money
Whilst that fine wasn’t particularly significant given the sheer amount of money generated in Formula 1, any time taken from a team’s wind tunnel allowance could mean delayed development – potentially costing valuable race wins, making compliance even more key.
“We’re very, very keen to make sure that our understanding of those regulations, and the implementation of those regulations are obviously, first and foremost, compliant – there’ll be no question,” Taylor continues.
“But equally, we need to find ways to make sure that we’re able to deliver against the goals of the organization and [the team] wants to be challenging for the podium, race wins, and world championships again.”
He adds the partnership with SAP is especially important, particularly the use of its SAP Cloud offerings alongsidereal-time financial analytics and predictive analysis. SAP’s AI tools will be used by the team to optimize supply chains, manage inventory, and crucially, to forecast budgets – all within the cost cap framework.
“To do all of those things around a new set of regulations and with major transformational change going on in the background, there’s a huge amount to manage, a huge amount of moving parts to bring together to ensure that we’re successful,” Taylor adds.
“So it presents a massive challenge, but also that challenge obviously presents opportunities – and the team that can make the best of it across the regulation changes is most likely to be the team that will be successful next year and hopefully in the following years.”
A data-driven sport
Formula 1, much like technology, is all about data, as those who can collect, manage, and act on their data efficiently are at the forefront of the sport.
“Formula 1’s been a data driven sport for many, many years,” Taylor explains. ”Back in the 50s and 60s it was very much [dictated by] the stopwatch, but now obviously, lap time is key.”
But, track times aren’t the only ones that matter. Cars are built on a tight timeline, and upgrade packages are brought to the cars multiple times throughout the year – meaning that every minute, hour, and day with access to a new part or system means more practice, and therefore more data to further car development.
“These days the stopwatch is still the most consistent measure of the performance of the team. However, there’s a huge amount of telemetry on the cars for data collection within the organisation, and everything is focused around how we find opportunities to shave just milliseconds of time off the development and the performance of the car.”
SAP’s supply chain optimization is another key tool for Mercedes, with thousands of car components tracked, managed, and used within SAP. The hardware the team takes on track is, of course, vital to the car’s performance – and every single element is captured, logged, and tracked within SAP.
“SAP is an enterprise resource planning service about optimizing your resources across the whole of the enterprise and making sure that all of the things that we need to do and get done are done to a level and a standard of quality and performance that’s befitting of a world championship winning Formula 1 team,” Taylor explains.
Indirect gains
The availability and readiness of parts is crucial to development, and does have a correlation to times on track – in an indirect kind of way;
“We focus solely on whatever we can do to get parts to the car to make it go faster and as quickly as possible,” Taylor explains.
“If we’re able to then push some of the change into the supply chain, [this] helps us bring back the timeline on the delivery of those things – bearing in mind that we’re bringing innovation and improvements and changes to the car on a race by race basis.”
“So anything that we can do to save a few minutes, a few hours, or even days, ultimately or indirectly will help to then put the car or products on track,” he adds, helping the team focus on time on track, ensuring a smooth transition into next year’s regulations, and hopefully, getting Mercedes F1 back to winning championships.