Toto Wolff is engaged in advanced talks to sell a portion of his ownership stake in the Mercedes F1 outfit.
The deal values Mercedes at £4.6 billion – an unprecedented figure for an F1 team – after McLaren were valued at £3.5bn in a change of corporate structure last September.
Wolff, who owns one-third of Mercedes F1, plans to divest a shareholding in the region of five percent.
Wolff, aged 53 will remain as team boss and CEO if the sale goes through.
Shareholder Breakdown
The other shareholders in the team are Mercedes-Benz and industrial group Ineos Group, who both hold one-third of the enterprise.
An official representative said: "We will be making no official statement on this. The governance of Mercedes F1 stays unaltered, and all three partners are fully committed to the ongoing success of the brand in F1."
Valuation Growth
The deal signifies a significant increase in worth of the Mercedes team after Ineos Group acquired its stake for £208m in 2022.
This surge reflects the growth in valuations of F1 teams in the past few years as a consequence of the increasing appeal of Formula 1 globally.
This trend was evident with the success of the F1 movie starring Hollywood star Brad Pitt, which was released in summer 2023 and earned over $630 million (£458 million) at cinemas worldwide.
It is Pitt's most successful movie and the most successful sports film to date.
Present Performance
Mercedes are runner-up in the constructors' championship, behind McLaren Racing, with three Grands Prix remaining in the current championship.
Mercedes' primary racer British driver George Russell has won two of the 21 grands prix so far and is in fourth place in the drivers' championship behind McLaren's Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Red Bull Racing's Max Verstappen.
Mercedes secured a record eight straight constructors' championships and seven driver championships, six won by Lewis Hamilton and one by Nico Rosberg, between 2014 to 2021.
