Dr Theissen said: "We have discussed this with Williams for half a year now. You know that has always been the main topic of our discussions. We are just aiming at what is the usual way to go in the industry today, in the auto industry; every company has to deal with separate locations, different locations. The key to success is an integrated project management, programme management, and we have spent a lot of time together with Williams to exchange our ideas and to try and find a common idea how to proceed. That was achieved in the past weeks so we were able to close the deal.
 
Dr Theissen further explained this aspect of integration by saying: "Well, as I said before the project management is the backbone of all the operations. Besides that, we want to offer our resources, which of course have been put in place for road car development, and to adapt them for Formula One needs in order to speed up our development slope and to include all the best knowledge a big automobile company has and to come to common solutions.

We will start with the power train. We have been supplying the engine for four years now and now we are, as our first focus, we are looking at the gearbox and parts connected to this. I wouldn’t say we are out to do gearboxes in competition with Williams. I would rather say we will integrate our resources, our knowledge, our test facilities, simulation facilities, and the aim is to have an integrated powertrain programme with people from Williams and people from BMW working at the same project."
 
As for the delay in making the final announcement regarding the extension of the contract between BMW and WilliamsF1 Dr Theissen added: "I would say it was a very fruitful learning process. We have approached each other from different positions, both parts of the team have learned about the experience of the other side and so we got together and that in the end was the key to come to a deal."