Fueling generations of Ferrari fandom

There are 396 million Scuderia Ferrari HP fans around the world. Some are young, eyes wide with wonder, faces painted with rosso corsa, drawn in by a driver, or a moment on track that sparked something they can’t quite explain. Others carry decades of memories, handing down their passion like a family heirloom, the kind of love that skips no generation. Spanning ages, cultures, and nationalities, all are united by passion for Scuderia Ferrari HP. All can be called Tifosi, the Italian word for “fan.” This community represents a powerful and lasting legacy.

Scuderia Ferrari HP asked IBM to reimagine the team’s app to bring Tifosi and team closer together. The opportunity and challenge were extraordinary: serve lifelong fans who can name every race winner since 1950 alongside a surging generation drawn in by the drama, the culture, and the sport’s rise into global popular culture, who engage with Ferrari in entirely new ways. Both matter. Both belong.  Very few fans will ever attend a Grand Prix, which means for the other 390+ million, the app is the bridge. It is race day. It is the team. It is Ferrari. The vision was an app that could go deeper: real-time race engagement, personalization that reflects how each fan lives their passion, interactive features and community that bring fans together around shared moments, and space for the Tifosi to share their own stories — because inside every one of those 396 million fans is a story worth telling, a connection worth nurturing. A community that feels seen stays. A community that grows, converts. A community that thrives across decades is the Ferrari legacy, sustained.

To transform the experience, Scuderia Ferrari HP worked closely with IBM Consulting®  to completely redesign and rebuild the team’s mobile app experience using IBM watsonx® technologies, and hybrid cloud infrastructure.

“IBM brought all of its experience from projects like the Masters and Wimbledon,” says Luca Mazzone, Head of Digital Experience at Scuderia Ferrari HP. “That really helped us accelerate the process of ideation, design, and development.”

The collaboration began with extensive research into fan personas, from hardcore racing enthusiasts to first-time followers, to better understand how fans consume content and interact during race weekends. IBM Consulting then redesigned the app architecture and user experience using IBM Design Thinking principles, mapping out the digital journeys of every kind of end user and updating the navigation accordingly.

“Whether you’re designing experiences for sports fans or retail customers, the work must begin with an intimate understanding of their needs,” says Fred Baker, Sports Lead for IBM Consulting. “That’s the upfront work that drives outcomes in the end.”

The new Scuderia Ferrari HP app combines AI, data and immersive storytelling to create a next-generation platform that can serve any kind of fan. For the hardcore race enthusiasts, IBM watsonx.ai® powers AI-generated race summaries while the interactive Race Centre delivers telemetry, strategy insights and race analysis.

For those looking to have a little fun, there are quizzes and exclusive behind-the-scenes content from drivers and team personnel. And history buffs can explore the “Iconic Races” content built from AI-generated historical insights. The app also includes multilingual support, in-app commerce and future-ready personalization capabilities designed to deepen engagement across Ferrari’s global fan base.

There is even a section dedicated to honoring the Tifosi themselves, with beautiful photography, video, and storytelling that shares the personal journeys of the team’s biggest fans. “We wanted to build something that would make the Tifosi feel seen,” says Elizabeth O’Brien, Program Director with IBM’s Sports and Entertainment Partnership team. “Every fan has such unique and powerful stories to tell. We just gave them a platform.”

Under the hood, IBM created a scalable hybrid cloud architecture integrating IBM Cloud®, AWS and Red Hat OpenShift®. IBM watsonx.data® unifies information across Ferrari’s racing, retail and brand ecosystems. And software like IBM Instana® automates many of the IT operations, improving reliability and observability across the platform and helping the Scuderia Ferrari HP team operate more efficiently.

This is more than just a one-time makeover, however. In fact, the 2026 season introduced new AI companion capabilities, enhanced gamification and richer live experiences. New features included free-text AI fan interactions, countdown quizzes, digital badges, private prediction leagues and enhanced Race Centre functionality designed to keep fans engaged beyond race weekends.

Since the app launched in May 2025, the team has seen measurable improvements in fan engagement, app performance and digital innovation, including a reported 35% increase in cumulative downloads and a 62% increase in page views. In fact, Scuderia Ferrari HP has said it they has seen nearly every fan engagement metric improve dramatically. And the new fans are among the most loyal, with 73% of them registering their accounts.

But that’s only half the story.

“The AI features have helped us be more productive, generating content and new insights that, until now, we weren’t able to produce,” says Mazzone, referring to the time savings experienced by the editorial team.

That’s the magic of great AI-powered experiences, according to Baker. “Delivering a great fan experience was always priority number one,” he says. “But when AI is done right, you can drive fan, or customer, engagement while also increasing efficiency on the back end. It’s a classic win-win.”

Today, the app serves as a scalable digital hub for Ferrari’s global fan community, combining AI, live race intelligence and immersive storytelling to bring fans closer to the team than ever before. But going forward, it is a foundation for an unlimited future of personalization and innovation.

Founded in 1929, in Maranello, Italy, Scuderia Ferrari HP is the most successful and storied team in Formula 1 history, with 16 Constructors’ Championships and 15 Drivers’ Championships.