Luca di Montezemolo joins McLaren board of directors

McLaren Group Holdings Limited filed on UK's Companies House to appoint Di Montezemolo as the ninth director on the company's board.

McLaren Group Holdings Limited controls the McLaren Automotive business and has a minority stake in the McLaren Group which owns McLaren's Formula 1 team as well as its other racing operations.

Di Montezemolo will not be involved in the McLaren Formula 1 team as his role will be restricted to McLaren Automotive that was recently taken over by Abu Dhabi-based investment firm, CYVN.

CYVN hired Nick Collins as CEO for McLaren Automotive and he will also serve on the board of directors alongside Di Montezemolo in addition to McLaren Group Chairman, Paul Walsh.

McLaren Racing and its parent company McLaren Group remained owned by Bahrain's Mumtalakat, the sovereign wealth fund of the Kingdom of Bahrain.

Di Montezemolo left his role at Ferrari back in 2014 after poor results in F1 for the Scuderia and disagreements with the late Sergio Marchionne who was the CEO of FIAT at the time.

The Italian joined Ferrari back in 1973 and was soon put in charge of the F1 team by founder Enzo Ferrari. Under his watch, Ferrari won constructors' titles between 1975-1977 with the late Niki Lauda who secure two drivers' crowns at he time, 1975 and 1977.

He was appointed as president of Ferrari after the death of Enzo Ferrari in 1988 and was tasked with bringing the Scuderia back to contention.

Di Montezemolo then assembled the Ferrari dream team: Jean Todt, Michael Schumacher, Ross Brawn and Rory Byrne who dominated F1 between 2000 and 2004.

Under Di Montezemolo's watch Ferrari won the drivers' championship in 2007 with Kimi Raikkonen replaced Schumacher. The team won the 2008 constructors' title.

Since then Ferrari have failed to win any title and while Di Montezemolo has been away from F1, he was a VIP guest at the 2025 Bahrain Grand Prix.