Adrian Newey, Chief Technical Officer, Red Bull Racing has been voted 2024 World Car Person of the Year. The award is based on voting done by a jury panel representing over 100 journalists from 29 countries.
Newey was the finalists amongst five global captains from the automotive industry including Maruti Suzuki India’s CTO, C V Raman; Andreas Preuninger, Director GT Model Line, Porsche; Lisa Reeves, Head of Interiror Design, Volvo Cars and Stephan Durach, SVP Connected Company Development, BMW Group.
Aerodynamicist Newey is the designer and driving force behind the RB19, the most dominant race car in the history of Formula One. In 2023, it won 21 of 22 races enabling Red Bull’s sixth and Max Verstappen’s third World Championships and establishing the design concept to be pursued by most of its competitors. After 35 years in Formula 1 and more than 200 victories for cars of his design, Newey is at the absolute peak of his spectacular career.
The World Car of the Year Award was first introduced in 2018 which saw Hakan Samuelsson, President and CEO, Volvo Car Group win the maiden Award. In 2019, Sergio Marchionne, CEO, FCA; Chairman, CNH Industrial; and Chairman and CEO, Ferrari won the award. Carlos Tavares, CEO, PSA Group won the award in 2020; followed by Akio Toyoda, President & CEO, Toyota Motor Corporation in 2021; Luc Donckerwolke, Executive VP for Design and Chief Creative Officer, Hyundai Motor Group in 2022 and SangYup Lee, Executive VP, Head of Hyundai and Genesis Global Design Center, Hyundai Motor Company in 2023.
