Ford agrees to buy Cosworth Racing

   Copyright c 1998 Nando Media
   Copyright c 1998 Reuters

LONDON (Jul 13, 1998 - 9:45 EDT) - U.S. car giant Ford Motor Co said on
Monday it had agreed in principle to buy the Cosworth Racing engine
division of Cosworth Engineering from Audi AG, the upmarket car subsidiary
of Volkswagen AG.

Audi itself reached full agreement on Sunday to buy the Cosworth engine
unit from British engineering group Vickers Plc for 117 million pounds
($190.8 million).

Ford said in a statement that Cosworth Racing had worked together very
closely with Ford for more than 30 years, while the sale would allow Audi
to focus fully on the engineering development, casting and manufacturing
capabilities of Cosworth.

"Cosworth has played a significant role in Ford's motorsport heritage
and we are delighted with the outcome of the negotiations," said
Martin Whitaker, motorsports director for Ford of Europe, in the statement.

"The agreement will allow Cosworth Racing to continue to draw on
Ford's gloabl engineering capabilities in meeting our commitments in
Formula One, Indycar and Touring Car Racing," he added.

No financial details of the deal were given.

Cosworth Racing will be wholly owned by Ford and will continue to be based
in Northampton in central England.

--- Msged/386 4.20 beta 4