As Bradley is in the news i'm again (and finally) prompted to ask this question… Why do bike manufacturers not get involved in having teams of their own and leave it to 'nuetral sponsers'? I know in the past we've had 'team peugoet' and 'team raleigh'. The only rcent one I know of is the Bianche (how's it spelt?) team… After all we have it the other way round in our beloved sport… Cheers for any sensible answers

They already do by supplying the bikes to the team, which is a huge financial commitment. They can't afford to then spend additional millions on being the principal sponsor, especially as it would generate very little additional revenue.

Well when Team X get thrown out of a tour becuase they're all doped up to the eyeballs, it kinda reflects badly on the push iron manufacturer.

Dunno but money talks and people like Garmin, Sky, Radio Shack have lots of cash.
Plus the bike manufacturers get the publicity by letting teams use their bikes.

They do sponsor teams, but I don't think they have the cash to support a full team at pro-tour level.
BMC is pro continental next year with Cadel Evans and George Hincapie, there is the new Raleigh team and others that I can't think of at the moment apart from Cervelo of course. I think Cervelo worked out that supplying CSC/Saxo bank was going to cost them something like €2 500 000 which prompted them to set up their own team so just supplying the bikes is cost enough.

The same reason Toyota/Honda etc pulled out of F1; bad return on investment.

Its all making sense now considering the amount of money it does cost to put in several racing days back to back when on tours. Way more so than an elite/pro mtb team for sure… And like yous say the manufacturer still gets their name banded about on the bikes etc

Money.

For a Continental level team (3rd Division – possible invite to races like the TOB and others in Europe), with up to 10 riders a bike manufacturer will pay around €500,000 plus the providing of equipment per season.

A ProTour team, such as Columbia HTC, you'll be talking around and over €1,000,000 plus around 100 or so bikes, hence why in the road scene the big teams ride the big brands.