RED BULL & INFINITI
Red Bull could be set to lose its major title sponsor Infiniti.
Just as the world champion team is faltering on the pre-season test circuits, Germany's Sport Bild reports that the luxury Nissan brand Infiniti does not intend
to renew its Red Bull deal beyond 2015.
Reports estimate the value of the deal, involving team naming rights and a conspicuous purple presence on the Red Bull livery, at EUR 40 million per year.
It is believed Infiniti is baulking because it wanted to move beyond being merely a financial partner to the top F1 team.
"We know that Infiniti had hopes for a greater technical cooperation," Red Bull's Dr Helmut Marko acknowledged.
Former F1 driver Gerhard Berger, a close confidante of team owner Dietrich Mateschitz, commented: "If anyone can overcome the loss of a sponsor, it is
Red Bull."
WILLIAMS'
New Martini-themed 2014 livery will be unveiled on 6 March, a week before the F1 circus gathers in Melbourne for the season opener.
Initially, it was believed the Grove team would pull the official wraps off its highly-anticipated new title sponsorship deal during Bahrain testing.
But that theory was dismissed on the basis that alcohol advertising is not allowed in Arab countries.
It is reported that Williams' deal with the iconic Italian vermouth label would be announced on the Wednesday or Thursday of Australian Grand Prix week.
But according to France's Auto Hebdo, the British team has finally confirmed the real launch date -- March 6, exactly a week before the paddock bursts to life
in Melbourne.
RED BULL
World champion Sebastian Vettel finally managed some laps but at a sluggish pace on Thursday as Red Bull's pre-season crisis continues.
His tally of 59 laps in the troubled Renault-powered RB10 ended fears Adrian Newey's latest creation might never run at all, but he was more than five
seconds off the pace set by Kevin Magnussen in the McLaren.
"We still have lots of problems - large and small - that we need to fix," Vettel is quoted by the German newspaper Die Welt.
Red Bull's Dr Helmut Marko admitted that the task now achieved was simply to get the RB10 to work, and that on Thursday the car "was just rolling around".
Vettel is quoted by Bild newspaper: "The lap times are not the best, but the first thing was to get the car running."