It’s remarkably expensive and challenging to implement an ERP, especially from ground zero (which I’d consider excel to be). Most business these days are merely upgrading and that’s a considerable amount of effort right.
You usually need a whole team, but the need knowledge of the business, so you end up taking people away from the job they are good at because you need their expertise in the setup of a new system. I imagine that’s particularly painful in a costcap F1 world.
I’ve been seconded away from my day job to support the upgrade of a portion of our ERP from one vendor to another and it takes a team of 20 people over 3 years.
Might as well apply for a Williams position now lol
Well that was the best race of the season so far but that’s not saying much! Well done Carlos Lots of talk about him joining the new Audi (Sauber) team next year but I can’t see that, would be a waste of time imo. Would like to see him at Merc or Redbull. Prefer to see him still at Ferrari tbh.
George and Alonso
Wow, that was an interesting YouTube video but I think it has to be an exaggeration that they were using Excel as the enterprise manufacturing software. I ran a small engineering and manufacturing business years ago (30-50 people) and we had full “digital” MRP and document control system implemented. A relatively simple MRP system wouldn’t have made any dent in the budget; A few late parts and it would have paid for itself.
Carlos drove away from Charles easily too, I think he legitimately could’ve had a shot at Max all things being equal. I’m actually disappointed Max retired as I would’ve loved to have seen a true battle between him and Carlos.
Just listened to Beyond the Grid with Ayao Komatsu and it was a cool interview.
One interesting note I got out of it was that Steiner had asked Haas to invest more into the team to increase performance, so Haas actually threw some money at it and got the Rich Energy money for 2019, but then they built that atrocious 2019 car, so Gene basically was like “okay I threw money at it and we actually made a worse car with the increased budget, so no more spending until we figure out how to use our money wisely and work cohesively”. So that’s Ayao’s goal is to get the three HQs communicating better and using the resources they have in the most efficient way possible, rather than asking Gene for money again. Seems like a lot of people give Haas shit for “not investing” or “not spending enough to show commitment” but I’m thinking he might be right. If I threw millions at a problem and it got worse, it would be the definition of insanity to double down and throw more at it.
Anyway, Komatsu seems like a really sharp and likable guy. My favorite bits of these interviews are hearing from team principals or team employees who have worked with many legendary drivers, talking about what made each driver stand out and what their strengths and weaknesses were. Great to hear that insight from someone who was literally looking at the data and working side by side with these drivers 24/7.
He is trying way too hard and pushing when he doesn’t need to. Feeling the pressure and I would imagine after Australia where they took his car away, he is even lower mentally than before.
His speed isn’t bad, he can be close to Albon, even across a race, but he is making way too many mistakes to hold onto that seat unless something changes quickly.
I think I drove on the simulator he had developed the code for. I started at Loughborough on the same course the year after he finished his PhD and having some driving experience I was tapped to “work” on the next PhD students thesis driving the simulator and real life machinery.
I remember I think on here somewhere I wrote I thought when he came to F1 he was making too many rookie mistakes still in F2, I watched every F2 race that year. Finessing his driving to remove those errors along with the pressure of F1 would be too much of a mountain for him.
I feel like Williams have kind of ruined his career by plucking him into that seat when he wasn’t ready, something Toto hinted at the other day when talking about Kimi A being something special but not quite ready and ‘not making the same mistake as Williams did with Logan’
I feel sorry for him really, he seems to be a real nice guy who always goes over to meet the fans and do autographs.
Given we’re at historical lows for new seats for rookie drivers (2025 is a bottleneck moment, but will soon rest back at historical lows), drivers have to take the opportunity when presented regardless of experience or whatever because the likelihood is it’ll never be offered again.
Couldn’t agree more, and no way Logan could’ve nor should’ve turned it down. My point was Williams shouldn’t have offered it when it was obvious he wasn’t ready.
Lots of talk about him joining the new Audi (Sauber) team next year but I can’t see that, would be a waste of time imo. Would like to see him at Merc or Redbull. Prefer to see him still at Ferrari tbh.
