LONDON: The Red Bull Racing Formula 1 team has announced technology major Oracle as its new title sponsor in a five-year agreement worth a reported $500 million.
Red Bull Racing, while introducing its new team name as Oracle Red Bull Racing, also unveiled the team’s new car for the upcoming season – the RB18.
While financial details were not disclosed, The Associated Press reported that the five-year title sponsorship was worth around $100 million a year, placing it among the most lucrative commercial deals in sports.
As part of the title sposorship, Red Bull Racing’s 2022 season will feature expanded use of Oracle Cloud across its most significant areas of operation, including analytics-based race strategy, optimized engine development, AI and machine learning-powered driver training and a tailored fan experience.
Taking advantage of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) during last season’s championship run, the team increased the number of simulations they ran by 1,000x to improve the accuracy of their predictions and sharpen their decision-making. In addition, they accelerated simulation speed by 10x, which gave race strategists more time to make the right call. Equally important, OCI significantly reduced the cost of billions of simulations, allowing the team to cost-effectively improve performance on the track, which is critical for success under F1’s stringent spending regulations.
This season, OCI will enable the Oracle Red Bull Racing Team to expand the volume and variety of data they analyze and increase the speed at which simulations run in order to better predict tactics that will lead to the podium.
Along with its on-track initiatives, Red Bull Racing will continue to deliver an exceptional experience to its global fan base. Last season, Oracle and Red Bull Racing launched a fan loyalty platform powered by OCI – The Red Bull Racing Paddock – to bring the excitement of F1 to fans all over the world. Since The Paddock’s inception, Red Bull Racing has seen a more than nine times increase in member sign-ups.
The new, direct line of communication between fans and the team has created outstanding engagement, with registered fans submitting thousands of questions to the team and redeeming 35,000 digital rewards. In 2022, Red Bull Racing will incorporate new features and capabilities, including the ability to create user-generated content, to bring an even deeper layer of personalization to fans.
OCI powers engine development, driver training, and esports team
Additionally, Oracle is working with Red Bull Powertrains to develop the next generation of F1 engines set to debut in 2026 as Red Bull Racing becomes one of only four current manufacturers supplying engines for F1. Red Bull Powertrains will use OCI to optimize modeling of its new engine combustion chamber to reduce costs while improving results.
Red Bull Advanced Technologies and Oracle are also partnering to help develop the next generation of world-class drivers. Through projects applying AI and machine learning, Red Bull‘s junior drivers will better understand how data can inform and fine tune their driving style to reduce their lap times.
The Oracle Red Bull Racing Esports marks the evolution of a partnership in one of the world’s fastest growing sporting industries, esports. Taking a cue from its real-world counterpart, the team will use OCI-powered analytics to optimize car set up, improve race strategy, and provide its drivers with training that can help them consistently post ideal lap times on any virtual track, in any simulated weather.
