10 January 2024 , 17:00
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Guenther Steiner has been replaced as Haas team principal.
The 58-year-old departs the team he built from the ground up after securing financial backing from American owner Gene Haas. He served as team principal from the moment the team's entry into Formula 1 was secured.
At the time of his departure, Steiner was the third-longest-serving team principal on the grid. Only Red Bull chief Christian Horner and Mercedes boss Toto Wolff have been in their respective roles for longer.
He will be replaced by Ayao Komatsu, who has been one of Steiner's top lieutenants throughout his tenure. The 47-year-old has also been with Haas since the team began racing in F1 and has been a paddock regular for 20 years.
Under Steiner's leadership, the team established itself on the F1 grid at a time when privateer outfits were struggling to make ends meet. Aided by the boom in the sport's popularity and the introduction of the budget cap, Haas was able to become a commercially viable outfit.
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F1's burgeoning popularity coincided with the rise of Steiner's own reputation. He was one of the most prominent personalities on the Netflix Drive to Survive series, endearing himself to an army of new fans with his blunt honesty and penchant for uttering memorable one-liners.
His own popularity boost was also useful for the team from a marketing perspective and opened up new commercial possibilities. However, that has not been enough to appease the owner who has grown tired of the team's poor on-track performance.
Ayao Komatsu has been promoted to team principal at Haas (Getty Images)The American team finished rock bottom of the constructors' championship in 2023, for the second time in three years, with just 12 points scored. Despite a more experienced driver line-up in stalwart Kevin Magnussen and new addition Nico Hulkenberg, the team was simply unable to build a competitive car.
The lack of performance was at the heard of the statement from Gene Haas as he announced Steiner's departure. "I'd like to start by extending my thanks to Guenther Steiner for all his hard work over the past decade and I wish him well for the future," he said.
"Moving forward as an organization it was clear we need to improve our on-track performances. In appointing Ayao Komatsu as team principal we fundamentally have engineering at the heart of our management.
"We have had some successes, but we need to be consistent in delivering results that help us reach our wider goals as an organization. We need to be efficient with the resources we have but improving our design and engineering capability is key to our success as a team.
"I'm looking forward to working with Ayao and fundamentally ensuring that we maximize our potential - this truly reflects my desire to compete properly in Formula 1." The Haas press release featured no quote from Steiner.
Komatsu said of his appointment: "Having been with the team since its track-debut back in 2016 I'm obviously passionately invested in its success in Formula 1. I'm looking forward to leading our program and the various competitive operations internally to ensure we can build a structure that produces improved on-track performances."