Photo: W Series
W Series’ administrators Evelyn Partners have provided more details of the huge debts the championship racked up in its short existence.
According to information made public by Companies House, W Series Ltd owes its creditors more than £17 million. Those owed the most include Formula 1 (through multiple companies), the circuits that hosted races during the final season in 2022, various suppliers from the hotel, catering and motorsport industries and the drivers themselves who have not received their $1.5 million 2022 prize fund.
The fleet of 20 cars used in races, plus two non-working show cars, raised proceeds of just over £1 million, although after the initial buyer of “a significant number of the racing cars” failed to pay up, a second online auction was required to finally dispose of them. Trailers, spares and other assets raised a further £257,000 when they were sold.
In addition, as first reported by Formula Scout, the series’ intellectual property including social media, domain names, trademarks and branding was acquired by Formula E for £110,000.
After deducting the costs of £1 million and repaying DHL £512,000, to cover its rights over assets that had been loaded onto containers for transport to the cancelled race in Austin, a total of £688,515 remains to cover the amounts owed by the company.
However, as the latest report from the administrators sets out, the company’s debts amount to a whopping £17.2 million.
Since being set up in 2017, initially as She Championship Ltd, the shareholders, who include the likes of David Coulthard and Adrian Newey, contributed over £30 million in capital. As shareholders are at the back of the queue when a company is wound up, there is no chance of this ever being repaid.
In effect, W Series lost a total of £47 million, equivalent to over £2 million for each of the 21 races held across its three seasons.
It appears that none of the prize money due for the final season was paid to the drivers, leaving Jamie Chadwick owed £394,900 (the sterling equivalent of the $500,000 champion’s prize fund), with Beitske Visser and Alice Powell, second and third respectively, also out of pocket by more than £100,000 each. F1 Academy points leader Abbi Pulling is owed £81,624.
The largest single creditor is the company’s biggest shareholder and director Sean Wadsworth, who is owed a total of £6.5 million, primarily from a loan to the company. The other company director, Catherine Bond Muir, is owed £211,900.
Listed among the remaining largest creditors are: Formula One Marketing (£1,333,407), Coulthard’s brand management company Velocity Experience (£1,082,189), DO & CO International Catering (£503,067), HM Revenue and Customs (£264,925), insurance brokers Gallagher (£182,035) and Tatuus (£111,336).
The administrators are still pursuing debts owed to W Series, but they assess the probability of recovery of funds as “uncertain”.
If that is the case, while secured creditors such as HMRC and company employees are likely to be repaid, the remaining creditors will almost certainly never see more than a miniscule fraction of what they are owed.