Ferrari Changes 2011 Car Name Into F150th Italia

After it has emerged late yesterday that Ford is suing Ferrari for the use of the “F150” trademark in Formula 1, everybody expected the Scuderia's official response during the course of today. Well, an official statement is yet to be released until this point, but some details released by the Italian company have hinted that they will change the designation of their 2011-spec car in due time.

While avoiding to refer to their single-seater throughout the Thursday action in Jerez – where the second group test of the season kicked off earlier today – Ferrari has brought a few amendments to some of their earlier reports on the car, changing its name from Ferrari F150 to Ferrari 150th Italia.

For example, one report that dated back to the Valencia tests says “before the lunch break, Fernando Alonso completed just over two hundred kilometres at the wheel of the Ferrari F150th Italia.”

Ford's legal action against Ferrari, issued in the Detroit Federal Court on Wednesday, also refers to Ferrari's creation of the ferrari150.com website. Consequently, the Italian company has also changed a previous report regarding their dedicated site, saying “two million hits from 149 countries for the Ferrari F150th Italia on the Ferrari (web)site.”

A third and final correction of Ferrari was made to the first report about their new car, when the media event was broadcast live on the Internet. “Web surfers were able to follow the presentation of the Ferrari F150th Italia live” now reads the report.

Ferrari initially explained the use of the F150 designation by celebrating the 150th anniversary of Italian unification. However, both the F150 name and the logo used for it resemble a lot to Ford's F-150 trademark for its famous pickup truck model.

We're yet to find out whether the two companies have settled the dispute out of court or if Ford's legal actions will proceed.