London City Airport Sold for 750 million
Published October 11th, 2006
The deal, which was announced today after an auction process that lasted for around three months, is expected to value the east London airport at around £750m.
Linklaters is acting for both AIG and the consortium as a whole — made up of GE Capital and Credit Suisse’s infrastructure funds — with private equity partner Richard Youle leading for the consortium and corporate partner Jeremy Parr acting for AIG.
The magic circle firm was instructed to advise the consortium earlier this summer on the basis of its existing relationship with both AIG and Credit Suisse.
The acquisition took place following a hotly-contested auction in which other bidders are rumoured to have included consortia led by institutions such as Spanish infrastructure group Sacyr Vallehermoso, Balfour Beatty, ABN Amro and German company Fraport.
Ireland’s William Fry acted for the seller, Irish billionaire Dermot Desmond, who only paid £23.5m for City Airport in 1995. Corporate partner Ken Casey led the team.
