Caterham F1 team's former factory to be sold

LONDON (Reuters) - The failed Caterham Formula One team's Leafield factory in central England is to be sold off with auctioneers saying on Thursday they were seeking offers of more than 5.5 million pounds ($8.36 million). BNP Paribas Real Estate and Carter Jonas said they had been appointed by administrators to sell the facility which previously housed the now-defunct Super Aguri and Arrows F1 teams. Caterham, founded by Malaysian Airasia airline entrepreneur Tony Fernandes as Lotus Racing in 2010, failed to score a point in five seasons in Formula One and went into administration with 200 staff made redundant last October. They folded after raising money through crowd-funding to compete at last year's Abu Dhabi season-ender. The team's cars and other factory equipment has been sold off through a series of auctions. British driver Will Stevens, who raced for the team in Abu Dhabi and is now with tail-enders Manor Marussia, told reporters at the Spanish Grand Prix on Thursday he had considered buying as a memento the steering wheel to the car he drove. "It would be cool to have my steering wheel from my first grand prix to keep but I'm not sure if it's still around any more," he said. "I'm not sure how much it would even go for." (Reporting by Alan Baldwin in Barcelona, editing by Justin Palmer)