Magneti Marelli: First Sponsor Victory in the IZOD IndyCar Series

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Jun 06, 2013, 09:00 ET

MILAN and DETROIT, June 6, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

Thanks to Simon Pagenaud from the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports Team

The victory seals the presence of Magneti Marelli in the USA both in motorsport and in the technologies for production vehicles, with an increasing industrial footprint.

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20130606/618705 )

Simon Pagenaud, top driver of the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports team, sponsored by Magneti Marelli, last Sunday won the second race of the Belle Isle (Detroit) round of the IZOD IndyCar Series. This is the first victory ever for Simon Pagenaud and for the Schmidt Peterson team in the IZOD Indycar Series and also the first success for Magneti Marelli in the Formula Indy as a team sponsor as well as technology supplier.

Magneti Marelli is technical sponsor of the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports team with its logo present and visible on the side and nose of Pagenaud's single-seat car.

Magneti Marelli Motorsport provides powertrain technology and fuel components to different teams of the IZOD IndyCar Series and it's also a technical partner of Honda Perfomance Development (HPD).

The partnership with the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports team is part of the framework of the strategic presence of Magneti Marelli within the context of international motorsport, in the shape of technological laboratory and incubator for the development of new technologies and solutions with possible application in production cars, fueling and inspiring new "green" solutions within the context of "sustainable mobility".

High performances and eco-sustainability, a binomial that used to be judged unusual in the past, are driven by the growing need for cost, consumption and emission reduction where the link between the world of motorsport and ordinary cars assumes even greater importance, for example in relation to powertrains (hybrids and GDI) and infotainment systems (broad-band data transmission systems).

This element is also proving to be of interest in the USA where the EPA (United States Environmental Protection Agency) has established for the future precise standards in terms of energy efficiency in the transport sector, indicating strict targets of average "miles per gallon" consumption for fleets of new vehicles.

Motorsport is also one of the flagship activities of Magneti Marelli in the USA, a country in which the company has had an established industrial presence since 1976 and a strategic partnership with Mopar for the distribution of all-makes components in the north American aftermarket. The footprint of Magneti Marelli in the NAFTA area extends between Auburn Hills (MI), Sanford (NC), Pulaski (TN), El Paso (TX) in the USA and Juarez to Tepotzoplan in Mexico in the business areas of powertrain, electronic systems, lighting, exhaust systems and suspensions.

Within the Lighting sector in particular, on 16 June Magneti Marelli will open a new production site at Pulaski, Tennessee. In relation to the issue of vehicle energy efficiency, together with areas such as powertrain, infotainment, exhaust systems and light-weight materials, lighting technology is of strategic importance as the combination of evolved lighting solutions such as LED and Xenon 35 and 25 Watts for the various functions of front and rear lighting are capable of significantly affecting consumption and emissions of cars, to the point of a reduction of 2 grams of CO₂ per kilometer.

Returning to motorsport, in the 2013 season that is already underway, Magneti Marelli has further expanded its presence as supplier of strategic systems and components for the main teams in the most important motorsport competitions worldwide. Examples include: injectors on all the single seaters in Formula 1, KERS and telemetry systems for a number of top teams in F1, vehicle control units and data acquisition devices (Data Logger) in the WRC, engine electronic control units, data acquisition and other components in MotoGP and SBK, telemetry systems in Le Mans Prototypes (LMP), complete powertrain systems for GP2 and GP3 series, sole supplier of the Data Logger in championships such as WRC, WTCC and CTCC in China and powertrain components in the IZOD championship IndyCar Series in the USA.

Company info at:

http://www.magnetimarelli.com

http://www.spmindycar.com

SOURCE Magneti Marelli