McLaren Racing on track to hit $1bn in revenue as chief's pay reaches record

McLaren Racing is on track to become the first Formula One team to notch up $1bn in revenues this year, in the slipstream of Championship-winning performances which fuelled a record payout to its boss, Zak Brown.

Sky News has learnt that the Woking-based outfit, which recently extended the contract of World Champion driver Lando Norris until 2030, will file accounts this week showing that its sporting revival has sparked an unprecedented commercial bonanza.

Sources familiar with the figures said the accounts for McLaren Racing Ltd were expected to show revenues of £588m ($779.6m), buoyed by sponsorship deals such as a naming rights agreement with Mastercard and partnerships with National Lottery operator Allwyn, Google, ports operator DP World, Intel and the cryptocurrency exchange OKX.

Money latest: UK diesel price hits all-time high

The accounts, which cover the calendar year 2025, are also expected to reveal that Mr Brown, who has revitalised the team's performance since taking over as boss in 2016, was paid well over $100m (£75.4m) last year.

Sports industry insiders said it would rank among the largest annual pay packages handed to an F1 executive.

They added that it would reflect both the team's stellar sporting and commercial performance, with the bulk of the package tied to a share award triggered by the value of a buyout deal involving McLaren Racing last year.

In 2024, Mr Brown was paid a base salary of £6m and a long-term incentive plan (LTIP) award of £31m, which already made him one of the best-paid sporting executives in the world.

Although the McLaren Racing accounts also include its IndyCar operations, F1 accounts for over 90% of the company's revenues.

When Mr Brown took over as executive director and boss of the F1 team a decade ago, it was an also-ran on the grid and performing poorly in commercial terms.

While he had begun to arrest that decline in the early years of his tenure, the COVID-19 pandemic nearly sank McLaren's motorsport operations as well as the group's road car business, which are now separately owned, albeit by the same Middle Eastern shareholders.

Last year, the Bahrain sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat and Abu Dhabi-based investment group CYVN Holdings bought out the 30% of McLaren Racing owned by external shareholders at an overall valuation of about £3.5bn.

That compared to a valuation of £560m in a rescue deal struck during the pandemic involving external investors.

The transaction during the COVID outbreak provided urgently needed capital to the wider McLaren Group, whose automotive arm's finances had been left in a parlous state.

McLaren Group engineered a series of capital injections, the sale of its Applied Technologies division and the sale-and-leaseback of its spectacular Surrey headquarters in a bid to strengthen its balance sheet.

It has since reacquired full ownership of its Woking base.

McLaren's constructors' championship victory in 2024 was its first in over two decades, while last year it won both the drivers' and constructors' titles.

Mr Norris currently sits in fourth place in this year's drivers' standings, with his Australian team-mate, Oscar Piastri, down in seventh.

The team is third in the constructors' table, but trails leaders Mercedes by a sizeable 232 points.

Under Mr Brown's leadership, McLaren has become one of the biggest commercial powerhouses in global sport, drawing a roster of blue-chip sponsors, many of which are new to motor racing.

Part of McLaren's commercial success is also the result of rising global interest in F1, which in turn is often attributed to audiences drawn to its fly-on-the-wall Netflix series, Drive To Survive.

A number of other F1 teams have also drawn renewed interest from potential bidders at multibillion dollar valuations in recent months.

McLaren Group's automotive arm announced this month that it would create 1,000 skilled jobs in Britain as part of an investment package hailed by the government as a vote of confidence in UK industry.

Founded in 1963 by Bruce McLaren, the group's name is among the most famous in motorsport.

In total, the team has won more than 200 Grands Prix, three Indianapolis 500s and the Le Mans 24 Hours on its debut.

A spokesperson for McLaren Racing declined to comment on Monday on the financial details contained in its accounts.

(c) Sky News 2026: McLaren Racing on track to hit $1bn in revenue as chief's pay reaches record