Photo: LN4 Fusion
Reigning Formula 1 World Champion Lando Norris has joined up with former Prema team principal Rene Rosin to launch a new racing team, LN4 Fusion.
The team, launched to great fanfare before the Italian Grand Prix, has ambitious plans to enter championships on each rung of the junior single-seater ladder from Formula 4, via Formula Regional Europe and FIA Formula 3, to Formula 2.
As an initial step, the team has acquired selected assets from AIX Racing, including its entry in the 2027 FIA F3 championship. Entries have been submitted for Italian F4 and FREC, while the team plans to apply for a slot on the grid in the new three-year F2 cycle beginning next year. It is also exploring an additional programme in British F4.
Announcing the new venture, Norris explained his motivation to build “a race team that can compete with the best in junior motorsport, with great people and a great environment for drivers to develop.
“I’ve been really lucky to have some amazing people around me throughout my career, and I know that getting to Formula 1 takes so much more than just talent. You need the right people around you, the right support and the right opportunities at the right time.”
According to the team, Norris “will play an active role in shaping the organisation’s identity, culture and approach to driver development.”
Co-founder and CEO Dan Richards will lead “the corporate strategy and work with the investment group and shareholders,” with responsibility for “LN4 Fusion’s ownership structure, investment decisions, financing and wider corporate governance.”
Richards is also Chief Operating Officer of Just Develop It Ltd, the investment group backing the initiative. According to its latest published accounts, Just Develop It group, whose core activity is “money lending”, had net assets of £330 million at 31 January 2025.
The return of Rosin, who had established Prema as the dominant force in European junior single-seater racing after succeeding the team’s founder, Rosin’s father Angelo, has been anticipated for several months, with whispers of a potential deal with AIX first surfacing in May.
Photo: Formula Motorsport Limited
Nevertheless, Rosin’s involvement alongside Norris and the programme’s financial backers is a major boost for the project’s success.
LN4 Fusion acts as a brand of a Milan-registered entity, Alphabet Racing Italia S.r.l., itself controlled by Alphabet Racing Limited, a company incorporated in Jersey. Alphabet has been hiring extensively for positions in its Italian operation.
“Following extensive discussions,” Rosin will take on the role of team principal “in a consultancy capacity,” having been “approached by the group after it had already begun evaluating its motorsport strategy.”
Rosin, his wife and former Prema PR and Media head Angelina Ertsou, and Guillaume Capietto, the highly-respected engineer who will take on the role of LN4 Fusion’s Racing Director, were in attendance throughout the Monza weekend in the F2/F3 paddock.
The main team will be based in Veneto in northern Italy, while British operations will be run by Dan Hazlewood from a base in Cambridgeshire.
Alongside the racing team, Norris has also set up the LN4 Legacy Programme to help “talented young drivers get opportunities they might not otherwise have.”
Underlining his personal commitment to putting something back into the sport, Norris will “personally fund the majority of the LN4 Legacy Programme’s operating costs through his own commercial income and [will] remain actively involved in the selection and mentoring of every driver admitted to the Programme.”
This young driver scheme, likely to be flooded with applications from underfinanced but talented hopefuls, will be led by former Alpine sporting director Julian Rouse and operated by ADD Management, who currently oversee the careers of F3 title rivals Freddie Slater and Ugo Ugochukwu, as well as Norris himself.
Photo: LN4 Fusion
The new team, and Norris’ personal involvement, were strongly welcome by Stefano Domenicali, President and CEO of Formula 1, and Bruno Michel, CEO of F2 and F3.
For Domenicali, “seeing Lando Norris involved in this new project is an incredible statement on how much the pyramid of F3 and F2 is crucial to the future of F1. Through Lando’s investment and experience, we can build a future, with new drivers, engineers, mechanics, and a tradition that will be followed by motorsport lovers.”
Michel welcomed Norris’s involvement in F1’s support series. “Lando has been the first Formula 1 World Champion coming from Formula 2, and to have him involved in one of our teams is extremely positive. I am certain that this will be a serious project and they will bring a lot of expertise to our Championship. I’m also glad to see Rene Rosin back in our paddock, with this new challenge.”
AIX Racing has not yet commented on its plans, although an announcement is expected over the Madring weekend.
Rival teams welcomed the arrival of such a high-profile team and the return on such an influential figure in the junior paddock as Rosin. The publicity and increased competition were widely seen as adding to the prestige and professionalism of the ladder below F1 and dominated paddock conversations at Monza.