Ove Andersson led the Panasonic Toyota Racing team into the world of Formula One in 2002. He retired from the position of ToyotaF1's team principal in 2003 but remained close with them and worked as a consultant at Toyota Motorsports. 

Toyota Motorsport about this shocking news:

"Everyone at Toyota is extremely shocked and truly saddened at this terrible news." said Tadashi Yamashina, Chairman of Toyota Motorsport GmbH. "Ove was an inspiration to our team and to many in motorsport. His passion for motorsports was legendary and he is a great loss to out sport."

Andersson started his career as rallydriver in 1962 and got his first victory during the rally of Monte Carlo. One year later he founded Andersson Motorsport, which later would grow to Toyota Team Europe. Toyota Team Europe was bought by Toyota in 1993 and continued with the name Toyota Motorsport. They won the rally world championship four times. Toyota Motosport announced their interest in the Formula One in 1999 and with that ended their successful rally program. ToyotaF1 debuted in 2002.

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