F1 headquarters is ‘dynamic opportunity’ for Fishers

The new Cadillac Formula One team that will be headquartered in Fishers could bring with it more opportunities for high-tech companies to take root in the city that has made the business of technology a focus for more than a decade.

The F1 open-wheel racing series will have 11 teams next year. Nine are headquartered in cities in England, Italy or Switzerland. One other, MoneyGram Haas, is based near Charlotte, North Carolina, with major production facilities in England and Italy.

And then there’s Cadillac F1, which will be headquartered at a new 400,000-square-foot facility near Indianapolis Metropolitan Airport in Fishers.

Finishing touches are being added to the $200 million headquarters that was the brainchild of former Andretti Global CEO Michael Andretti, who relinquished control last year to business partner Dan Towriss. The deep-pocketed Cadillac F1 team is owned by Detroit-based General Motors Co. and Indianapolis-based TWG Motorsports, a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate holding company TWG Global owned by billionaire co-chairs Mark Walter and Thomas Tull with headquarters in New York and Chicago.

“It’s truly a dynamic opportunity,” Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness said.

Fishers has worked for years to attract companies in the technology, research and development, and biosciences sectors. The city’s roster includes Fishers-based INCOG BioPharma Services, Indianapolis-based Genezen Laboratories Inc. and Italy-based Stevanato Group. Its Indiana IoT Lab has become an oasis for tech firms big and small.

All that considered, an F1 team will fit the environment the city has created, sports-business experts told IBJ. F1 teams employ engineers, mechanics, aerodynamic experts, research and development technicians, and more. Some F1 teams have at least 1,000 employees.

To get the Cadillac F1 operation started, TWG Motorsports has assembled a team of about 300 people working on aerodynamics, chassis and component development, software, and vehicle dynamics simulation across locations in Indianapolis; Charlotte, North Carolina; Detroit; and Silverstone, England.

“F1 teams are really technology teams,” said Marc Ganis, owner of Chicago-based sports agency Sportscorp Ltd. “They’re not as much sports organizations as they are really technology operations. When you think of McLaren, McLaren is really a technology company.”

Ganis added that F1 cars are more technologically complicated than those in IndyCar, so teams require more square footage, more technical personnel and a more complex operation.

For example, while IndyCar engines are powered by E85, a blend of gasoline and ethanol, and need to be refueled multiple times each race, F1 cars have hybrid engines that use batteries that are recharged with fuel. F1 rules do not allow cars to be refueled during a race.

“They have very large teams, very large technology operations, for everything from the motors to the aerodynamics,” Ganis said. “The amount of data that comes in is just enormous. So, the idea of attracting that all to Fishers is likely to create a node of expertise that will then be able to be used for all sorts of industries, especially motorsports.”

Ken Ungar, principal at Indianapolis-based sports marketing firm Charge, said he expects the Cadillac F1 facility to draw in support businesses that interact with the motorsports and technology industries, similar to the way motorsports operations have taken root for decades near Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

“It certainly cements central Indiana’s reputation as an international motorsports hub,” Ungar said. “These types of businesses tend to attract other businesses to the region, so I think it’s very consistent with Fishers’ strategy to attract those kinds of businesses.”

Fadness said the global reach of the Cadillac F1 team and its ownership group will “put Fishers on the map from an exposure standpoint.”

“I think racing is truly an industry that has spinoffs, whether it’s in marketing, branding, science, technology, research, all that can come to bear,” he said. “And so, I think there’s a real opportunity for future economic development.”

Big money

Running an F1 team takes money and resources, two things the ownership group behind the Cadillac F1 team does not lack.

TWG Motorsports parent TWG Global has controlling interest in Major League Baseball’s Los Angeles Dodgers, soccer’s Premier League Chelsea Football Club, the WNBA’s Los Angeles Sparks, and the Professional Women’s Hockey League, and it has a stake in the NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers.

TWG Motorsports, led by Walter and company CEO Towriss, is also the majority owner of Andretti Global, which competes in the NTT IndyCar Series, Indy NXT and Formula E; NASCAR’s Spire Motorsports; and the Wayne Taylor Racing IMSA sports-car program. It also has a stake in Walkinshaw Andretti United, which competes in Australia’s Supercars Championship.

While the F1 team will be housed in Fishers, TWG Motorsports’ other racing programs will be based at the former Indianapolis Star printing facility on Georgetown Road in Indianapolis.

“The amount of money that it will take to get this started is very significant,” Ganis said. “So it’s going to entail a lot of money being spent in Fishers [to start up], and then on an ongoing basis, it will be significant.”

Walter is CEO of Guggenheim Partners LLC, a Chicago- and New York-based privately held global financial services firm with more than $300 billion in assets. In 2002, he co-founded TWG Global, which invests in six industries: artificial intelligence, financial services, insurance, merchant banking, sports and entertainment, and technology.

TWG Global owns multiple financial services companies under subsidiary Delaware Holdings LLC, including Zionsville-based Group 1001 Insurance Holdings LLC, the company Towriss leads as CEO. Gainbridge Insurance Agency LLC, a subsidiary of TWG Global and Group 1001, holds naming rights for the Indianapolis 500 and Gainbridge Fieldhouse, home of the Indiana Pacers and Indiana Fever.

Walter’s net worth is $10.6 billion, according to Bloomberg. That is compared with net worths of $5.1 billion for Pacers Sports & Entertainment chair and owner Herbert Simon and $4.8 billion for Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.

Tull, Walter’s partner at TWG Global, is an entrepreneur and film producer who cofounded California-based Legendary Entertainment, which produced films such as “Batman Begins,” “Interstellar” and “Inception” while he was CEO before he left the company in 2017. Tull has a net worth of $3.7 billion.

Fadness said the resources available to the Cadillac F1 ownership group are on “a whole ’nother stratosphere,” creating an unprecedented opportunity for Fishers.

“Those individuals and their resources and their global reach is something that we’ve never seen the likes of here in Fishers, or really, frankly, in Indiana,” he said. “And to have them call Fishers home for their headquarters is really exciting.”

Given the deep pockets of the team owners, Fadness said he expects additional development will happen around the Cadillac F1 headquarters.

TWG Motorsports has options to develop 67 additional acres on Indianapolis Metropolitan Airport property. In 2015, the city of Fishers and the Indianapolis Airport Authority reached an agreement to make 211 of the airport’s 445 acres available for development. Approximately 30 acres remain on the market.

The mayor said the city is working with the race team’s ownership group to identify what might be the right real estate development around the headquarters. He expects announcements for future development will come over the next 12 to 24 months.

“To have 67 acres to reimagine what it could be, there’s a lot of potential,” Fadness said.

Creating a powerhouse

Despite his vast professional background, it is perhaps Walter’s ownership of the Dodgers that is most widely recognized. Before the 2024 season, he approved what was at the time the largest contract in professional sports history—a 10-year, $700 million deal for megastar Shohei Ohtani—and the team continued its high-spending ways this past offseason.

Ungar pointed to TWG Motorsports’ hiring of former NASCAR executive Jill Gregory as evidence the group is also prepared to compete at the highest levels in racing. Gregory is chief operating officer of TWG Motorsports and president of Andretti Global.

“I think what happened with the formation of TWG Motorsports is that it has created a powerhouse in terms of both the resources and expertise that will be brought to bear,” Ungar said. “There certainly would be synergies between the different sports franchises that the different owners have, but that also creates a very deep bench in terms of executive expertise.”

David Morton, former principal of Indianapolis-based consulting firm Sunrise Sports Group, said the resources available to the Cadillac F1 team under TWG Motorsports are “on a completely different plane” than people in central Indiana would recognize.

“I think when people realize what TWG is and who’s behind it and what they’re already doing in Europe and in sports and other areas of the world, then they go, ‘OK, it’s those guys,’” he said. “When people get beyond [the exit of Michael Andretti], they’ll realize, here’s what did happen and here’s the doors that have been blown open because now this team has become a reality and here are the people behind it. Then it’s a massive story.”•

CORRECTION: The rendering originally included with this story (and in the March 14, 2025, issue of IBJ) was an outdated one. The correct rendering has been posted at the top of the story. You can see more corrections here.