What Is Ayao Komatsu’s Net Worth and Salary?
Ayao Komatsu is a Japanese Formula One engineer who has a net worth of $2 million. Ayao Komatsu was named the Team Principal for the MoneyGram Haas F1 Team in early 2024, and he was formerly the team’s trackside engineering director. Ayao began his motorsport career with British American Racing in 2003, working as a tyre engineer. He has also served as a performance engineer for Renault, a race engineer for drivers Vitaly Petrov and Romain Grosjean, and a chief race engineer for Lotus.
Salary
Formula 1 Team Principals earn between $1 and $10 million depending on seniority, success and various performance milestones. When he was hired by Haas in early 2024, Ayao Komatsu’s salary was likely closer to the $1 million per year range.
Early Life
Ayao Komatsu was born on January 28, 1976, in Tokyo, Japan. He is the son of Yuichiro and Keiko Komatsu. In 1995, Ayao moved to England to attend Loughborough University. He graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Automotive Engineering in 1999, followed by a Ph.D. in Vehicle Dynamics and Control in 2003.
Career
Komatsu began his motorsport career in 2003, working for British American Racing as a tyre engineer. He spent two years with the Brackley team, and in 2006, he took a job with Renault as a performance engineer. Ayao started out working with the test team and was later promoted to the race team. During his time at Renault, he worked with drivers such as Romain Grosjean, Nelson Piquet Jr., and Vitaly Petrov. After Mark Slade left Petrov at the beginning of the 2011 season, Komatsu began working as Vitaly Petrov’s race engineer. Renault’s team changed its name to the Lotus F1 Team in 2012, and that year Ayao became Romain Grosjean’s race engineer. The duo scored nine podium finishes while working together. After the 2014 season, Komatsu was promoted, becoming Lotus’ chief race engineer, and during the 2015 Belgian Grand Prix, he helped the Enstone team and Grosjean score a podium.
(Photo by Qian Jun/MB Media/Getty Images)
When Grosjean left Lotus for the Haas F1 Team, Ayao went with him and became the team’s trackside engineering director in 2016. After signing a sponsorship with the money transfer / peer-to-peer payment company in 2023, the Haas team became known as the MoneyGram Haas F1 Team, and in January 2024, it was announced that Komatsu would be replacing Guenther Steiner as Team Principal. Team owner Gene Haas said of Ayao, “In appointing Ayao Komatsu as Team Principal we fundamentally have engineering at the heart of our management. We have had some successes, but we need to be consistent in delivering results that help us reach our wider goals as an organization. We need to be efficient with the resources we have but improving our design and engineering capability is key to our success as a team. I’m looking forward to working with Ayao and fundamentally ensuring that we maximize our potential – this truly reflects my desire to compete properly in Formula 1.” Komatsu stated of his new role, “I’m naturally very excited to have the opportunity to be Team Principal at MoneyGram Haas F1 Team. Having been with the team since its track-debut back in 2016 I’m obviously passionately invested in its success in Formula 1. I’m looking forward to leading our program and the various competitive operations internally to ensure we can build a structure that produces improved on-track performances.”
Personal Life
Ayao and his wife, Sachie, married in 2010. Komatsu has been a fan of Coventry City Football Club since the mid-1990s.
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