Helmut Marko claims that Mercedes are desperately offering departing staff double their salary in a bid to stop them from leaving for Red Bull. With Red Bull opening up their own Red Bull Powertrains division for 2022 and beyond, they have started hoovering up staff from the nearby Mercedes High Performance Powertrains division at Brixworth. Having already signed key engineer Ben Hodgkinson from Mercedes, Red Bull announced on Thursday of the Spanish GP that they have signed more personnel from their rival team. Steve Blewett, Omid Mostaghimi, Pip Clode, Anton Mayo and Steve Brodie are all currently in senior positions at Mercedes, but will join Red Bull once a period of gardening leave has been served. Marko believes the personnel are joining for a new challenge, and out of sheer passion, rather than finances. This is evidenced by his claims that Mercedes are offering double salaries to try keeping their staff. "Red Bull is a passionate racing team," Marko told Motorsport-Magazin. "It's all in one house. Mercedes offers people who come to us double the salary if they stay. We don't." With Red Bull able to take advantage of the proximity to Mercedes, and the fact that their newly established engine division requires building up, unlike Mercedes who will eventually have to downsize under financial restrictions, team boss Christian Horner had a little dig at Mercedes. "We certainly benefit from having our campus in England, where we have access to a lot of engineering talent," Horner said. "All the senior staff announced bring a lot of experience, expertise and innovation to the Red Bull Powertrains programme and provide us with the best possible engineering platform for the future."
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