Liberty Media chairman on 'important' Maffei: 'Such a great leader'

During Maffei's years in charge at Liberty Media, it has grown into one of the largest media, communications, sports and entertainment companies in the world. Formula E and MotoGP are also part of the US company's portfolio.

Chairman Liberty Media praises Maffei

Malone, therefore, has fine words for Maffei: "Watching Greg being interviewed and listening to his presentation this morning, he is a fabulous executive. He's done wonderful things for me and my shareholders. We certainly hope that our futures will come back together at some point when he's rested up. I certainly personally would invest in anything Greg wants to do. So I can't say enough about Greg, positively."

The Liberty Media chairman then talked about what would happen to Formula 1 now that Maffei is leaving: "As you know, I'm effectively the control shareholder of a number of businesses. Through my voting position, I will continue to vote approximately 49% of the votes in Formula One. It ain't going to be easy, but we will find a CEO for the holding company who will continue to support Stefano and the management team."

Malone himself does not see himself as a future CEO for Liberty Media: "Greg has assembled a great group of people at headquarters who will do the burden. At 83 years old, going 84, I'm unlikely to be a highly active CEO. So my role is entirely transitional to support the team".

This article has been created in collaboration with Matt Gretton