I find this news quite interesting to be honest.
There's been a bit of a rumour floating around that Codies won't be renewing the F1 license past the end of their current contract, which ends either at the end of this year or next year, can't remember when. These layoffs make a bit of sense when combined with the rumour; they may not affect the F1 team now as they're well and truly in development on F1 2015, but more cuts could be on the line after that game has been released, with the rest of the team that survive then moving to work on the next Dirt game which probably needs more than 20 people to finish. This could be especially true if F1 2015 is both a commercial and critical disappointment like 2014 is. A new engine combined with a new Creative Lead Director (as the one they've had since F1 2010 has now left CM) could revitalise the series, or it could make the same mistakes with a new coast of paint and be a huge financial loss to CM.
To add to this, apparently Microsoft of all companies wants to have the license next and they won't be challenged for it, as they would be the only ones to afford the ridiculous price of the F1 license right now. They would hand the development of the game to Playground Games, a studio based in the UK who currently work on the Forza Horizon games for the Xbox platform. This studio has plenty of racing game development pedigree. Former members of CM, Bizarre Creations (PGR series), Criterion (Burnout), Slightly Mad (NFS Shift/Project Cars), Black Rock (Split/Second) and Sony Liverpool (All the F1 games on PS1/PS2 up until CE on PS3 in 2006) are at this studio now. I personally enjoyed the first Horizon game on the 360 for what it was and apparently the 2nd game on Xbox One is pretty good too, so they've got some talent there.
There's gonna be massive problems with this if it does happen though. This move might improve the actual car physics as CM have missed the mark on this aspect throughout their tenure of owning the license. However as this game would still be on a console base with a similar target market to the current F1 games, the same arcade-sim mashup that CM aimed for might apply and make the driving model in these future games just as disappointing as the games we have now. Making two different driving models for arcade and sim players like F1CE would be great but I just don't ever see it happening as there's no real precedent for this in racing games in general anymore due to developer preference for unified experiences. The casual market on consoles is always larger than the dedicated sim market so usually compromises have to be made due to publisher pressure.
That being said, I get a feeling this could end up making the F1 series a console-exclusive series again like it was for Sony in the PS2 era anyway. Microsoft could release it for PC, but gaming wise their baby is the Xbox and the PC hardly receives any Microsoft published games anymore.
The F1 games occupy a niche space in the racing game community as it was never considered a true sim, yet the driving model in those games is still a bit more richer than your average arcade racer like NFS. Sim racers played the sims and continue to do so now and get their F1 content through community made mods, and casual racers play the easier to pick up and play racers out there. These F1 games were really only for F1 fans that don't enjoy traditional sims. That isn't exactly a huge market. F1 cars are even getting into console sims like Gran Turismo and Forza these days which means console-bound sim racers stick with the cars available in there as opposed to buying the F1 games, which obviously doesn't help.
However F1 2010 and 2011 were great successes on the consoles and that's why Microsoft might take the risk of developing an F1 game. However for many of us on the PC attention is definitely elsewhere and MS might see little point in releasing a F1 game on PC that could be instantly shunned by the community.
It is only a rumour though so take the essay above with a grain of salt
. However the more and more I hear about CM these days, the more I believe many of things above to be true.