Ferrari are to hold a special event in Milan to celebrate the team’s multi-year sponsorship agreement with Italian bank Unicredit in March.

It comes following the signing of Lewis Hamilton, the seven-time F1 World Champion, from Mercedes for the F1 2025 season.

Ferrari to hold special event after major sponsor deal struck

Hamilton confirmed almost a year ago that he would join Ferrari on a multi-year contract from F1 2025, ending his long and successful association with Mercedes.

Following the announcement on February 1 2024, Ferrari’s share price rocketed by more than 10 per cent to a new all-time high, with the union between the most decorated driver in F1 history and the sport’s most successful team poised to become a commercial juggernaut.

Ferrari announced last September that it had struck a ‘multi-year agreement’ with Unicredit, with the bank being at Ferrari’s ‘side in its Formula 1 racing activities.’

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In a joint press conference at the sponsors headquarters in Milan on Thursday, Ferrari and Unicredit confirmed that a special event will be held in the city in March.

It is expected to be a roadshow-style event involving Hamilton and team-mate Charles Leclerc and is set to take place between the end of pre-season testing on February 28 and the season-opening Australian Grand Prix on March 16.

The event is poised to give Hamilton an early experience of the team’s passionate fanbase, the Tifosi, ahead of F1’s return to Italy for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at Imola on May 18.

F1 will race twice on Italian soil for a sixth consecutive season in F1 2025, with the Italian Grand Prix at Monza scheduled to take place on September 7.

Benedetto Vigna, the Ferrari chief executive, said: “We are thrilled to embark on this exciting partnership with UniCredit, a bank that embodies the same spirit of innovation and excellence that defines our brand.

“Together with them, we will celebrate our heritage and continue to redefine the limits of possible in racing and financial worlds.

“This collaboration represents a further commitment to our clients, fans, and communities, ensuring they are at the heart of every initiative.

“United, we look forward to a future filled with passion and performance.”

Andrea Orcel, the CEO of the UniCredit Group, added: “UniCredit is extremely proud to launch this landmark partnership with a fellow Italian brand that respects its proud heritage, while looking globally and towards the future.

“Our multi-year partnership with Ferrari marks a new phase of collaboration, building a bridge between the worlds of finance and racing based on a strongly held, shared commitment: towards delivering our best for people in the right way.

“Working together, we will provide high-performance financial solutions that empower our clients and communities to progress, and ensure that Ferrari’s fans can get as close to the action as possible.”

Reports last month claimed that Hamilton is poised to strike a personal sponsorship deal with Ferrari sponsor Celsius, the energy drink.

It comes following the conclusion of Hamilton and Mercedes’ long-term agreement with Monster, now a McLaren partner, at the end of the 2023 season.

It has also been speculated that Almave, the non-alcoholic tequila brand co-founded by Hamilton in 2023, could become a Ferrari partner this season.

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Hamilton is expected to link up with Ferrari on Monday, with his first day at Maranello set to include a simulator session and meetings with his new engineers.

He is expected to take to the track at the Fiorano test track behind the wheel of Ferrari’s 2022 car, the F1-75, during the team’s traditional ‘wake-up’ test to get the drivers back up to speed ahead of the new season.

Hamilton’s pre-season schedule is then expected to take him to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, the home of F1’s Spanish Grand Prix, for a second TPC (Testing of Previous Car) run.

Ferrari’s F1 2025 car, codenamed Project 677, will be launched on February 19, one day after Hamilton and Leclerc appear at F1’s first-ever collective season launch event attended by all 10 teams in London.

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