Is Prestwick for sale? Good question, but it's hard to find a definitive answer. As 'Runway 31' points out, Infratil don't seem to have gone on the record as saying it's officially for sale, but they've dropped plenty of hints. The pointers suggesting that they do want to sell it include:
- this article, which states that they are "likely to realise $64 million for the sale of Lubeck Airport through an agreement with the local authority in the German city", which would reduce Infratil Airports Europe's portfolio to just Prestwick and Manston, thus raising a question over IAE's longevity.
- Information presented at their AGM (see here), which says "Improving capital allocation is a key focus for 2009/10 and is progressing. Capital spending has been tightened and capital is being extracted from low growth or low yield situations. To date that has meant the sale of Fullers and some bus depots and progress at the European Airports and Energy Developments". Although 'progress' could of course refer to just the potential sale of Lubeck.
- In their September update (here) they say "The European Airports have under achieved and capital is being extracted from those investments." Again, though, this could refer to just the $64m mentioned above in relation to Lubeck.
- and, continuing the theme, this says "Infratil faces a difficult financial market, and while the firm doesn't need to panic, it does have problems - underperforming European airports and some underperforming smaller investments, he says. Bogoievski will make some big decisions about what constitutes the core assets for Infratil over the next six months, Curley says. For one, Infratil is expected to sell its majority stake in Lubeck, an underperforming airport in northern Germany."
On the other hand though, browsing through some Prestwick photos on Flickr I noticed
this set of photos of what appears to be a pretty extensive (and presumably expensive) upgrade to the ATC systems in the tower. Similarly,
this article states that some of Manston's equipment is being upgraded at a cost of £2 million. Why make these investments if the airports are going to be sold shortly?
We might get a clearer indication of Infratil's plans for Prestwick over the next few months, as the boss there, Mark Rodwell, is returning to his native Australia next month (
source). (Interestingly, there's no mention of this on either the Infratil or Prestwick websites). His replacement could be interpreted as the litmus test of Infratil's intentions, as if they recruit a high-calibre candidate from outside then presumably they intend owning the airport for some time and the successful candidate has convinced his or herself that he or she isn't going to be suddenly working for a new employer a few months after starting. If, however, they don't then that could be interpreted as meaning that they don't intend much in the way of development of the airport and are happy to keep it 'ticking over' until someone takes it off their hands, although in fairness there could be plenty of other reasons why they would be content not to recruit a new manager (as opposed to promoting one from within).
I don't know who would purchase it in the current economic situation, with things compounded by Ryanair's stranglehold on the airport and the possibility of invigorated competition from Glasgow (depending on the outcome of BAA's appeal).
So is it for sale? I don't know, but it seems as if the next few months could be quite interesting.