Like so many people from the region, Dietrich Markwart Eberhart Mateschitz, born in 1944 in St. Marein in the Mürztal in Styria, and a marketing specialist known to friends as “Didi” for short, was enthusiastic about what was happening on the nearby Österreichring in the 1970s and was ultimately also influenced . Mateschitz’s death at the age of 78 was announced on Saturday night.
After the company was founded in 1984, motorsport in every form was the main field of his business activities. The first Red Bull athlete was Formula 1 driver Gerhard Berger in the mid-1980s. A similar Red Bull veteran is the two-time motocross world champion and tragic Dakar hero Heinz Kinigadner, with whom Mateschitz also founded the “Wings for Life” spinal cord foundation and who is in contact with the Red Bull KTM factory team in MotoGP holds. In Formula 1, ex-racing driver Helmut Marko is the most important intermediary for Red Bull.
The Austrian national anthem became a catchy tune
In the beginning, Mateschitz mainly supported young, daring and “cool” individual athletes, before he also promoted established sports such as ice hockey, alpine skiing and ski jumping in Austria. In accordance with the business expansion, Formula 1 then followed, initially in the 1990s through co-ownership at Sauber, but really from 2005 after the purchase of Jaguar and the transformation into Red Bull Racing, the really big internationalization step. A second Formula 1 mainstay with international reach was soon added to this with the junior team Toro Rosso (today AlphaTauri).
At the latest since the four world championship titles in a row by Red Bull Racing with the German Sebastian Vettel (constructors and drivers) between 2010 and 2013, the Red Bull can has been known in every corner of the world. Nowhere else in the world has the Austrian national anthem been heard as often as after Red Bull Racing victories.
And because at Mateschitz, despite all the economic considerations, sporting ambition was always at the top, they also dived through the following years, which were dominated by Mercedes, and returned to the top of the motorsport premier class with Dutchman Max Verstappen as a top driver. In 2021, the Dutchman won the drivers’ championship in a highly dramatic finale, and in 2022 it will probably even be both world championship titles again. As a driver, Verstappen is a double world champion.
In 2005, Red Bull took over SV Austria Salzburg – with success
Parallel to the Formula 1 adventure, Red Bull, for which sponsorship of team sports had been taboo for years, also began its multi-million dollar commitment in football in 2005 with the takeover of SV Austria Salzburg. This now includes several international academies and training centers as well as professional clubs in Salzburg, New York and Leipzig, among others. As in Formula 1, young talents are raised there via junior programs.
Red Bull Salzburg (FC Salzburg in international competitions) has had eleven unsuccessful attempts in the Champions League, but is 13 times the Austrian champion. Most recently, they won the league title nine times in a row. The club is also a nine-time ÖFB Cup winner, and after eleven failed attempts, they are currently in the Champions League group stage for the fourth time. The international breakthrough has been achieved.
After being taken over and founded in 2009 and having made a lightning leap from the fifth to the first German Bundesliga, Rasenballsport Leipzig has established itself there as a top club.
Not just applause
Of course, not all Mateschitz ideas took off immediately, and there were initially many negative reactions, especially in football. After the takeover of the Spielberg racetrack in 2004, where he had once been enthusiastic about motorsport, the billionaire, who was enthusiastic about aviation, had to bury his plans for an aviation academy again.
Ultimately, the “Spielberg project” with the race track (formerly Österreichring) reopened in 2011 as the Red Bull Ring as the core not only brought Formula 1 (2014) and the Motorcycle World Championship (2016) back to Austria, but also ensured enormous economic growth Revival of the region in Upper Styria. In 2022, for example, over 540,000 spectators came to the four major motorsport events there (Formula 1, MotoGP, DTM, GT Masters).
“We’re all about meaningfulness”
What also distinguishes Red Bull is the “project-like”. Merely sticking the logo on a sportsman’s cap or a vehicle has always been insufficient for the marketing specialist Mateschitz. “For us it’s about the meaningfulness, even if it may only be confirmed afterwards,” he once said.
While Red Bull initially appealed to younger target groups through extreme athletes, thanks to football and the like, there are no longer any upper age limits. In addition, Red Bull is also the world champion of brand staging in sports. One of the most complex and spectacular undertakings is Felix Baumgartner’s stratospheric jump from a pressure capsule hanging on a balloon from a height of 39 kilometers, which was broadcast live on Mateschitz’ television station ServusTV in 2012.
In terms of individual sponsorship, only the best and bravest end up at Red Bull. For example Lindsey Vonn, Marcel Hirscher, Anna Gasser, Thomas Morgenstern, Dominic Thiem or at international level Marc Marquez, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Sebastien Loeb, Ester Ledecka, Sofia Goggia, Robbie Naish and many others. Of course, the company often gets criticism because extreme athletes who are supported by Red Bull repeatedly pay for their daring with their lives.
“It has never existed in this form in Austria”
Whether fans or – sporting – opponents, Mateschitz was always respected by all sides. “For me, he is the parade entrepreneur par excellence in Austria,” Toto Wolff once said. “The way he created a brand and made it big has never existed in this form in Austria,” said the Viennese, who as head of motorsport at Mercedes is a main rival of the Mateschitz team.
Red Bull has set completely new standards for Marko. “Namely, that you even dare to go into Formula 1. Our really respectable successes (…) are only due to his (Mateschitz’, note) vision, his actions and his perseverance,” emphasized the Grazer once .
While football is expanding, it is always unclear in the expensive Formula 1 whether and how things will continue. The intended partnership with Porsche from 2026 was canceled only recently. In sports too, due to the ownership structure at Red Bull GmbH, it is largely unclear how things will continue in the future.
Source: Nachrichten
