It has been claimed that the previous method used by Bernie Ecclestone's F1 management body inflated the number of viewers watching each race by about 130 million, by including viewers that only watched small parts of the races on news bulletins.
A number of brands and media agencies use the statistics provided by Formula One Management (FOM) to work out the media value of on-air sponsorship.
According to sponsorship experts, such a reduction in audience figures could have a drastic effect on the value of future sponsorship deals.
Figures released by FOM for 2003 using the new system showed that the average number of viewers per race was 161,944,312.
According to Ben Pincus, chief executive of sponsorship agency The Works London, this is a major reduction in the viewing figures historically posted by FOM.
"It's widely accepted that over the past five or six years TV viewing figures as published by FOM have been in the region of 300 million viewers per race," he said.
FOM's statistics division was unable to provide information on 2002's global audience figures, as measured under the old system, for direct comparison.
It also declined to comment as Marketing went to press.
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