Hispania bought out by Thesan Capital

The troubled HRT team is set to undergo a third change of ownership

Hispania Racing has been bought out today by Spanish investment company Thesan Capital.

The team has confirmed that the investment group bought out a majority sharehold from current team owner Jose Ramon Carabante. This buy-out is similar to Genii Capital’s investment in Renault F1 last year.

Thesan Capital, a relatively new group, has stated that they intend to continue running the team as normal, in a statement released today:

Thesan Capital has reached an agreement by which it has acquired a majority 
shareholding in Grupo Inversor Hispania from José Ramón Carabante. Grupo 
Inversor Hispania is the main shareholder of Hispania Racing, owner of the sole
Formula 1 license in Spain, under which Hispania Racing races. Thesan Capital 
thus becomes the controlling shareholder of the Spanish Formula 1 team. 

The Spanish investment group will lead the development of Hispania Racing in the 
upcoming years, maintaining the current team and directors, which is one of the 
main assets of the company, and will try to develop and search for opportunities 
to optimize and improve the performance of the team in the upcoming seasons, 
alongside progressively making the team more Spanish and definitively settling 
the team in Spain.

The Thesan Capital team, who consider the acquisition of Hispania Racing as an 
opportunity to enter a sector with great prospects of growing, will work with
the aim of strengthening the strategic management of the group.

This is the third change in ownership since the team formed in late 2009. The outfit started out as Campos Racing, under the helm of Adrian Campos. However, the team was in turmoil before the 2010 season even started, and was rescued by Carabante and the Grupo Hispania, hence the name change.

While no other changes have been announced, rumours are abound that the team is set to link up with an existing Spanish operation, or construct their own Spanish factory, which is less likely. Epsilon Euskadi, the  team which just failed to enter F1 for 2011, and Addax (GP2 and GP3) are hinted to be favourites for a link-up.