European Commission clears takeover of London Luton Airport by AENA and AXA

European Commission cleared (10-Oct-2013) the acquisition of UK's London Luton Airport by AENA Desarrollo Internacional and AXA Investment Managers Private Equity. As previously reported by CAPA, TBI, a company owned by Abertis (90%) and AENA (10%) agreed to sell London Luton Airport Group Limited to a consortium of AENA (51%) and AXA (49%) on 01-Aug-2013. The enterprise value of the transaction is GBP433 million. The Commission stated: "The Commission assessed the effects of the proposed transaction on the markets for navigation services, airport infrastructure services as well as on the market for automatic handling material systems. The Commission concluded that the transaction would not raise competition concerns. Indeed the merged entity would not be able to shut out suppliers given its limited market shares, nor would it also be able to shut out customers because the target operates a single airport in the whole European Economic Area." [more - original PR]