McLaren receive £300million cash injection

Jamie Woodhouse
McLaren could mortgage factory and classic F1 cars to raise funds.

McLaren could mortgage factory and classic F1 cars to raise funds.

The McLaren Group have confirmed a cash injection of £300m from its shareholders as they look to navigate through the COVID-19 pandemic.

On top of the investment from its shareholders, McLaren are talking to third parties about boosting its working capital.

The British supercar manufacturer are also looking at altering the terms of bank loans to ease financial commitments.

McLaren is controlled by Bahrain’s Mumtalakat sovereign wealth fund, who hold a 57.7% stake, according to the Daily Mail.

The majority of McLaren’s staff have been placed on furlough leave as part of cost-cutting measures during the pandemic, whilst their Formula 1 drivers Lando Norris, Carlos Sainz and McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown have taken wage cuts.

The Formula 1 season is currently on hold due to the pandemic – going racing would be a huge relief for McLaren financially, but Norris says it’s important not to resume too early and put people’s health at risk.

“The quicker we can get back to all of us working together and doing the job that we want to do, which is working together as a team, trying to improve the car, beat the other teams, I’ll start climbing the ladder even more to the top spots. We want to be doing that as soon as possible” he told Racefans.net.

“At the same time it’s not down to us. It’s down to the safety of everyone else. Whichever track we might go to or we may go to, again I think [of] the people living there, the people which would be affected by a Formula 1 race.

“Of course, a lot of people want it. Formula 1 want it. The fans want it. There’s still a lot more people in the world which can honestly been affected by it. [But] if anything goes wrong, it can impact the sport in a big way.

“They’ve got to make a tough decision on how to do it, the logistics of everything, so on. I’m having fun as it is with what I’m doing. I’ve done a lot of races on a lot of different programs, esports events. I’m having a lot of fun.

“At the same time real racing is what I love the most doing. I live two minutes away from McLaren. I cycle there most days or I run past. It’s sad to see it in the state it’s in, literally with hardly anyone in there apart from the guys and girls that work on the ventilator project. It’s weird.”

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