MAG leads early Stansted airport bid battle | Reuters
In my opinion what happened at Gatwick is pretty much a blueprint for what the successful bidder for stansted will be looking to do. They will want some early wins and Luton customers will be an early target and I would expect Wizz to be the biggest target of them all. Ryanair and Easyjet will be playing the new owners looking for the best deal although neither Stansted nor Luton has the crucial first wave departure slots to incentivise new nightstopping carriers.
I have long believed that Stansted has a market for a “full service” carrier to operate to the main European cities with smaller aircraft such as the EM170 / DHC8. Manchester Airport has a good deal with Flybe feeding to the long haul maybe if they win they can build on that.
Then finally they need the long haul carriers and that is a harder ask, but Gatwick has managed to be successful in this regard against the odds so maybe Stansted can as well. Then the final piece of the jigsaw puzzle is Cargo and Stansted is well placed to do well in that area.