Aéroports de Paris management (Groupe ADP) has confirmed that it has entered into exclusive negotiations alongside partners Meriam and ASMA to acquire a majority stake in the Airport International Group (AIG), which controls Queen Alia International Airport (QAIA).

In a statement, Groupe ADP says that any agreement will obviously be subject to agreement being reached with its lenders as well as the Government of Jordan.

ADP ALREADY OWNS 9.5% OF AIG

Groupe ADP has been a 9.5% shareholder in AIG through its ADP International subsidiary for ten years (since 2007) with the airport handling 7.4m passengers in 2016.

World Duty Free at Amman Airport in Jordan.

It was also named best airport of its size (5-15m pax category) in the Middle East by Airport Council International (ACI) Airport Service Quality (ASQ) Survey last year.

Queen Alia International Airport first opened way back in 1983 and is located 35km from Jordan’s capital city of Amman and spans approximately 19m square metres

It features two runways and a relatively new Foster + Partners-designed terminal, which was inaugurated in March 2013 under the patronage of His Majesty King Abdullah II of Jordan and Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah.

Queen Alia International Airport.

WELL DEVELOPED RETAIL OFFER

Dufry/WDF is currently QAIA’s duty free departures and arrivals shop operator with seven locations at the airport where the shops were refurbished by the retailer two years ago. The company has held the concession for many years, having taken over Aldeasa in 2008 which previously worked with AIG for many years until it became part of the World Duty Free company.

Queen Alia International Airport (QAIA) welcomed 3,609,875 passengers during the first half of 2017, registering a 5.4% year-to-date (YTD) increase in passenger traffic in comparison to the same period in 2016.

Considered Jordan’s most important Public Private Partnership (PPP) project at one time, QAIA’s management and development contract was awarded by the Government to AIG in 2007 under a 25-year Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) concession agreement following an open international tender.