Sauber Petronas Engineering AG was a company owned jointly by the Swiss racing car manufacturer Sauber (60%) and the Malaysian oil company Petronas (40%). The company was founded for the sole purpose of building engines to the Sauber formula one team.
The engines were for many years nearly identical to the ones used by Ferrari but were branded Petronas. Sauber licenced nearly every legally licensable part from Ferrari and even had several Ferrari engineers on staff. Many pointed out suspicious similarities between Ferrari and Sauber chassis, but no formal accusations were ever made, even if FIA rules require each team to design their own chassis. After the 2005 season, Sauber was bought by BMW and the cooperation with Ferrari ended.
On December 21, 2009, Petronas was confirmed as moving from BMW Sauber to the newly formed Mercedes Grand Prix team.[1]
The company also helped develop motorcycles like Petronas FP1.