Heathrow Airport Holdings

Heathrow Airport Holdings Limited, by the end of 2012 BAA Limited, the owner and operator of the UK airports London Heathrow, Glasgow International, Aberdeen and Southampton and operator of several other airports worldwide. Since July 2006, the company owned by a consortium led by the Spanish Ferrovial Group.

History

The Law British Authority Act 1966, the British Airports Authority was created. This took over the responsibility for initially four airports owned by the state: Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted and Glasgow Prestwick. In the following years, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Southampton were added.

With the Airports Act, the company was privatized in 1986 through a public offering. The new company, BAA plc had to start a market capitalization of 1.225 billion pounds. In 1991, the Prestwick airport was sold. In recent years, BAA has expanded abroad. It took over all stores in several U.S. airports ( through its subsidiary BAA USA Inc. ) and is the sole operator of several airports in Australia and the USA. In December 2005, BAA took over 75 % of the airport Budapest Ferihegy, when it was privatized by the Hungarian government.

In July 2006, the company BAA was acquired by a consortium led by the Spanish Ferrovial Group ( in which Ferrovial 55.87 % holding, the Canadian pension fund Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec 26.48 % and the sovereign wealth fund GIC from Singapore 17 65%). This was done following a takeover bid for BAA plc in the amount of 10.1 billion pounds. As a result of the acquisition, the Company is no longer listed on the exchange.

From this assumption results in 2007, a resale of the shares in Budapest Airport to a consortium of Hochtief AirPort, the Caisse de Placement du Québec et Deposit, GIC of Singapore and KfW IPEX- Bank for 1.9 billion euros.

BAA has since 2006 also the subject of an investigation by the UK Competition Commission; In August 2008, it was recommended in a preliminary finding to force BAA to sell Gatwick, Stansted and Glasgow. In this framework, BAA announced in September 2008 its decision to seek a buyer for Gatwick. On 19 March 2009 the Commission announced its decision, according to the BAA 's airports London Gatwick and London Stansted and one of the Scottish airports (Glasgow or Edinburgh ) within two years must leave. . In October 2009, the sale of Gatwick to a consortium of financial investors led by Global Infrastructure Partners < / ref > was against the sale of the other airports zunäachst objection was raised; in October 2011, however, BAA announced its intention to want to sell Edinburgh Airport. In April 2012, eventually was sold to Edinburgh airport for the price of 807 million pounds of GIP.

In January 2013, the London-Stansted airport was sold for about 1.8 billion euros to the Manchester Airports Group.

Name

Although the company points out that the former name just " BAA Limited " was and the letters have no meaning, it has often been mistakenly referred to as " British Airports Authority ". The actual "Authority ", which is the authority in 1986 was dissolved as a result of privatization. Since the beginning of 2013, the Company will bear the new name Heathrow Airport Holdings Limited.