Daimler AG purchased a 45.1 percent share of Brawn GP on 16 November 2009, with Aabar Investments acquiring 30 percent simultaneously. The remaining 24.9 percent, held by the team management, was bought out in February 2011. In January 2013, Toto Wolff joined as executive director and acquired 30 percent of Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix Ltd, with Niki Lauda holding a further 10 percent as chairman of the board. In December 2020, INEOS announced a one-third equal ownership stake alongside the Mercedes-Benz Group and Wolff, taking effect on 25 January 2022. In 2025, Wolff sold a portion of his shareholding to George Kurtz, CEO of cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, who joined the team's strategic steering committee as technology advisor alongside Wolff, Mercedes-Benz chairman Ola Källenius, and INEOS chairman Sir Jim Ratcliffe.
Mercedes-Benz competed in Grand Prix motor racing in the 1930s as one of the dominant Silver Arrows marques alongside rivals Auto Union. Both teams were heavily funded by the Nazi regime, winning all European Grand Prix Championships after 1934. Rudolf Caracciola won three European Championship titles driving for Mercedes-Benz.
Mercedes-Benz returned to racing under the Formula One World Championship in 1954 under the leadership of Alfred Neubauer. The team fielded the technically advanced W196 in both conventional open-wheeled configuration and a streamlined body — the so-called Type Monza — which featured covered wheels and wider bodywork. Juan Manuel Fangio transferred from Maserati mid-season for the team's debut at the 1954 French Grand Prix, where Mercedes secured a 1–2 with Fangio and Karl Kling plus the fastest lap by Hans Herrmann. Fangio won three further races to claim the 1954 Drivers' Championship and retained the title in 1955, when Stirling Moss joined as teammate and won the British Grand Prix. The streamlined Type Monza won three of the team's nine total race victories, making them the only closed-wheel cars to have ever won Formula One races. Following the 1955 Le Mans disaster — in which Mercedes sportscar driver Pierre Levegh and more than 80 spectators were killed — the company withdrew from all motorsport at the end of the season.
Mercedes returned to Formula One in 1994 as an engine manufacturer in partnership with Ilmor, a British engineering company based in Brixworth, Northamptonshire. The partnership supplied Sauber for one season, then switched to McLaren in 1995 for a 14-year association that yielded one Constructors' Championship and three Drivers' Championships. Ilmor was rebranded as Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains in 2005. Mercedes also supplied Brawn GP in 2009, the year Jenson Button won six of the first seven races and claimed both the Drivers' and Constructors' Championships in Brawn's maiden season.
Daimler rebranded the Brawn entry as Mercedes GP Petronas Formula One Team for 2010, retaining Ross Brawn as team principal. Nico Rosberg and seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher — returning after a three-year absence — were hired as drivers. Results in the early years were modest, with the team finishing fourth in the Constructors' Championship in both 2010 and 2011. The AMG designation was added to the team name ahead of 2012. Rosberg took the team's first win since the 1950s at the 2012 Chinese Grand Prix, also the first Formula One victory by a German driver in a German car. Lewis Hamilton joined from McLaren for 2013, and Rosberg won the 2013 Monaco Grand Prix before Hamilton took the team's first Hungarian Grand Prix victory. The 2013 season ended with Mercedes second in the Constructors' standings behind Red Bull Racing.
A major regulation change in 2014 introducing turbocharged hybrid power units proved transformative. Mercedes won 16 of 19 races with Hamilton and Rosberg posting 11 one-two finishes. Hamilton claimed the Drivers' title 67 points clear of Rosberg; the team finished 296 points ahead of Red Bull in the Constructors' standings. This launched an era of dominance that produced eight consecutive Constructors' Championships from 2014 to 2021 — an all-time record — and seven consecutive Drivers' Championships from 2014 to 2020. Hamilton won six of those seven titles. Rosberg claimed the 2016 championship by five points over Hamilton before immediately announcing his retirement; Valtteri Bottas replaced him for 2017. The 2021 title fight reached the final lap in Abu Dhabi, where Max Verstappen overtook Hamilton after a controversial safety car restart. Hamilton finished eight points behind the champion. The team nevertheless secured the Constructors' title for an eighth consecutive season.
Mercedes introduced a radical zero-pod concept for 2022 under new ground-effect regulations. The car suffered aggressive porpoising and failed to deliver the expected performance. Russell achieved the team's sole win of the season in Brazil and finished fourth in the Drivers' Championship; Hamilton, in his final season with the team, failed to win a race or secure a pole position for the first time in his career. Technical Director Mike Elliott was replaced by James Allison mid-2023. Mercedes finished second in the Constructors' standings in 2023 without winning a race — the first winless season since 2011. In 2024, Mercedes won at the Austrian and British Grands Prix, the British win giving Hamilton his first victory since 2021 and breaking Michael Schumacher's record for wins at a single circuit. The team also won at Belgium and Las Vegas but finished fourth in the Constructors' Championship. On 1 February 2024, Mercedes confirmed Hamilton would depart for Ferrari from 2025; Mercedes junior Kimi Antonelli was announced as his replacement on 31 August 2024. Outside of Monaco, Russell finished consistently in the points through 2025 and won in Canada and Singapore, with both drivers securing a second-place Constructors' finish for the team.
New regulations for 2026 were widely forecast to favour Mercedes. The W17 proved immediately dominant, securing one-two finishes in Australia (Russell ahead of Antonelli) and China (Antonelli claiming his maiden victory ahead of Russell). Antonelli won in Japan to become the youngest Formula One World Drivers' Championship leader in history, surpassing the record previously held by Max Verstappen. At the Miami Grand Prix, Antonelli became the first driver to convert his first three consecutive pole positions into victories at the same events — a feat described by commentators as historic. He went on to win the Monaco Grand Prix, becoming the youngest winner of that race and the youngest driver to achieve a Grand Slam (leading every lap from pole with the fastest race lap). Mercedes led both the Drivers' and Constructors' Championships substantially through the early 2026 season.
Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains has been one of Formula One's foremost power unit suppliers. For 2026 the company supplies McLaren, Aston Martin, Williams, and Alpine in addition to the works team. Twelve Constructors' and fourteen Drivers' Championships have been won by teams using Mercedes-Benz engines across the marque's history as a supplier.
Juan Manuel Fangio won the 1954 and 1955 Drivers' Championships during the first Formula One era. Lewis Hamilton claimed six titles with the works team: 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020. Nico Rosberg won the 2016 championship.
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