Blackstone buys stake in UK airports group for £235mn

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Blackstone has struck a £235mn deal to acquire a stake in the owner of Aberdeen, Glasgow and Southampton airports, as infrastructure investors look to profit from the booming travel sector.

The US private equity group on Friday said it would buy a 22 per cent stake in AGS Airports from Canadian pension investor PSP, which will continue to own the rest of the business.

PSP acquired AGS last year from the Spanish construction group Ferrovial and Australian asset manager Macquarie at an enterprise value of £1.5bn, including a £900mn equity valuation.

It holds its stake in AGS via its Germany-headquartered company AviAlliance, which has also backed airports serving Athens, Düsseldorf, Hamburg and Puerto Rico’s San Juan.

Blackstone’s investment comes on the heels of a broader uptick in private investment in UK transport infrastructure.

Its infrastructure unit has also invested internationally in toll road group Mundys, private jet services company Signature Aviation and the airport manager behind Rome’s Fiumicino and Ciampino.

“Transportation remains a key thematic focus area for Blackstone, given continued strong global growth in leisure travel,” said Greg Blank, chief executive of Blackstone Infrastructure Strategies.

AGS, whose sites accommodated more than 11mn passengers last year, had one of the most diverse mix of airlines of any UK airport group, and was making changes to accommodate large aircraft and to open up new routes and boost traffic, he added.

Private investors back several of the UK’s leading airports including London’s Heathrow and Gatwick.

Last year, Ferrovial agreed to sell the vast majority of its stake in Heathrow to private equity group Ardian and Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.

Heathrow’s shutdown last week because of a fire at a nearby power substation has raised questions about the resilience of the UK’s infrastructure, leading to calls for further investment in contingency planning to avoid such disruptions.

Sandiren Curthan, PSP’s global head of infrastructure investments, said: “Both PSP and Blackstone are like-minded investors with long-term patient capital to support the development of AGS, which will benefit from the operational expertise of AviAlliance.”