Mercedes announces exit from Formula E at end of next year

Electric racing

Just days after claiming both drivers' and teams' titles in Formula E, Mercedes has announced its exit from the series – though it may not be the end of the team

Nyck De Vries Formula E

Nyck De Vries claimed the Formula E drivers' title this weekend – but now his Mercedes employers are quitting

Formula E

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The Mercedes-EQ team has announced it is to leave the Formula E series at the end of next season, just days after winning both the drivers’ and constructors’ championships.

Nyck De Vries secured the title in the team’s home Berlin E-Prix at the Tempelhof Airport circuit, with Stoffel Vandoorne scoring enough points to help bring home teams’ crown also.

Mercedes will exit the championship at the end of Season 8, the last year of the Gen 2 Formula E car. Joining it in the exit will be fellow German manufacturers BMW and Audi, who are both ending their involvement this year.

Whilst the BMW team will carry on under the Andretti name (the American organisation already runs the team on behalf of BMW), the outfit run by Audi will cease to exist as it focuses on a Dakar assault next year instead.

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Mercedes first became involved in FE with the HWA outfit two years ago, this then morphing into the Mercedes works team for last season.

However, as indicated in a statement by the manufacturer in a statement, this may not be the end of the team. Mercedes is investigating the sale of the squad so it can carry on into the Gen 3 era, which will see power increased to 350kW (470bhp), up 100kW (135bhp) from the current car.

The car manufacturer says it shifting resources to the full electrification of its road-going cars by 2030, whilst reaffirming its commitment to F1.

“At Mercedes-Benz, we have committed ourselves to fighting climate change at full force in this decade,” a statement from Mercedes-Benz board member Markus Schäfer said. “This demands the accelerated transformation of our company, products and services towards an emission-free and software-driven future, and to achieve this, we must give full focus to our core activities.”

“In motor sport, Formula E has been a good driver for proving our expertise and establishing our Mercedes-EQ brand, but in future we will keep pushing technological progress – especially on the electric drive side – focusing on Formula 1. It is the arena where we constantly test our technology in the most intense competition the automotive world has to offer – and the three-pointed star hardly shines brighter anywhere else. F1 offers rich potential for technology transfer, as we can see in ongoing projects such as the Vision EQXX, and our team and the entire series will achieve net-zero status by the end of the decade.”