Mercedes has a new name on the door. CrowdStrike founder and CEO George Kurtz has taken a minority stake in Toto Wolff’s holding company, becoming a co-owner of the Mercedes Formula 1 team in a move announced ahead of the Las Vegas Grand Prix.
The deal sees Kurtz acquire 15% of Motorsport Investment Limited — Wolff’s Guernsey-based vehicle — which translates to roughly a 5% slice of Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team. Crucially, it’s a carve-out of Wolff’s share only. The long-standing three-way balance between Wolff, Mercedes, and INEOS chief Sir Jim Ratcliffe is adjusted, but the team’s governance isn’t. Wolff’s voting power at board level remains unchanged, and he stays on as CEO and team principal.
Kurtz won’t be a passive passenger. He becomes Mercedes’ Technology Advisor and joins the team’s strategic steering committee alongside Mercedes chairman Ola Källenius, Ratcliffe, and Wolff — a clear hint at where Mercedes sees its next competitive edges coming from: software, security, data.
“George’s background is unusual in its breadth: he’s a racer, a loyal sporting ambassador for Mercedes-AMG, and an exceptional entrepreneur,” Wolff said. “He understands both the demands of racing and the realities of building and scaling technology businesses. That combination brings specific insight that is increasingly relevant to the future of Formula 1.”
CrowdStrike has been a Mercedes partner since 2019, and the fit is obvious to anyone who’s watched F1’s data arms race intensify. Cybersecurity and performance ops share a language: speed, precision, zero tolerance for downtime. As Kurtz put it: “Winning in racing and cybersecurity requires speed, precision, and innovation. Milliseconds matter. Execution counts. Data wins. Technology is reshaping competitive advantage and human capability everywhere, including motorsport. I’m excited to help the team securely accelerate forward.”
Numbers? No price tag was disclosed, but the math being whispered in the paddock is simple enough. A 15% slice of Wolff’s holding equates to about 5% of the team, and the implied valuation lands near $6 billion. That would top the circa $5bn watermark set by McLaren’s recent transaction, when MSP Sports Capital sold its 33% stake to Mumtalakat and CYVN Holdings — a staggering leap from McLaren’s 2020 valuation of around £560 million.
For Wolff, it’s the kind of portfolio management you make when your original 2013 buy-in — 30% at a team valuation of roughly $165 million — has multiplied beyond anyone’s fantasies. Realising a portion of that gain while keeping operational control and board influence intact is, in business-speak, tidy.
For Mercedes, it’s another step in broadening the team’s footprint in the United States and deepening ties to tech. Kurtz is more than a boardroom suit; he’s been racing professionally since 2016, with class wins at Le Mans, Sebring, Petit Le Mans and Spa on his CV, along with multiple titles. That duality matters. F1’s competitive margins are now shaped as much by software pipelines, secure cloud infrastructure and real-time analytics as they are by suspension kinematics. Marrying a racer’s instinct with a technologist’s playbook is not a bad way to attack a regulation era that increasingly rewards operational excellence.
None of this changes who calls the shots day to day in Brackley and Brixworth. The structure at Mercedes Grand Prix remains stable, and there’s no suggestion this is a staging post to something larger. It reads more like a strategic bolt-on: a fresh mind at the strategy table, more access in American boardrooms, and an owner group that looks a little more like the world F1 now swims in.
It also underlines a broader theme of the 2025 season: elite F1 teams are now valued like tier-one technology companies. Mercedes’ implied $6bn tag comes off the back of championship success, global brand equity and a commercial boom that shows no sign of slowing. The sport’s centre of gravity has shifted — on track and on balance sheets — and teams are upgrading their cap tables accordingly.
So, no fireworks at Brackley, just a quiet recalibration with a clear intent. Mercedes gets another technologist-operator in its inner circle. Wolff banks a win without losing a vote. And Kurtz steps from sponsor to stakeholder, bringing a few million lines of code — and a few hard-earned racing laps — with him.
