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Haas has no plans to alter livery after Rich Energy case

Haas has no plans to alter livery after Rich Energy case

22-05-2019 17:03

Bevan Youl

Haas F1 team has said that they have no plans to alter the livery of their cars after sponsor Rich Energy lost a court case against Whyte Bikes earlier in the week.

Whyte Bikes lodged a copyright infringement claim against drink company Rich Energy with a claim of the use of a near identical stag logo the bike company established.
 
The case has allowed Whyte Bikes to lodge an injunction against the drinks company to prevent it using the logo.
 
Team boss Gunther Steiner said to Motorsport: "We were told [that] when we need to change something they will tell us.
 
"For sure we check that everything is okay and we are doing everything they tell us.
 
“We don't have a problem with the logo, Rich Energy has a problem with the logo, so I don't know if they need to change it or if there is another solution.

"I am not going to get involved in their issues because they don't need me to sort that one out. For here [Monaco], we were told to keep the logo like it is and if there are any other instructions coming we are ready for it."

Despite the court ruling Steiner also stated that he wasn’t too concerned with any damage being done to the teams’ image and that Whyte Bikes made good publicly using images of the Haas F1 car in recent. Press statements.

"I think it is easy way for Whyte Bikes to get a little bit of publicity putting an F1 car on without paying the money for it, so fair play to them," he said.

"They can get a lot of publicity out of it, but we are not actively dragged into it because we didn't do anything wrong. Our car is there but it doesn't say that Haas did anything wrong, so I cannot even complain about that. They didn't accuse us of doing anything wrong. They just said the logo is on an F1 car."