Sport

International strategy pays dividends for Aer Rianta

AER Rianta owns and operates three airports in Ireland - Dublin, Cork and Shannon

By BARRY O'KEEFFE
Fri Jul 04 1997 - 01:00

AER Rianta owns and operates three airports in Ireland - Dublin, Cork and Shannon. In addition the company has management contracts to run duty free and retailing facilities at both sides of the Eurotunnel, Brusnichnoye on the Russian/Finnish border, Moscow, Kiev, St Petersburg, Kuwait, Bahrain, Damascus, Karachai, Beijing and Hong Kong.

Aer Rianta is a part-owner of Birmingham International Airport. Together with NatWest Ventures it has a 40 per cent stake in Birmingham for which it paid Pounds 40 million.

The overseas projects are run by the company's international arm, Aer Rianta International (ARI). This company had sales of Pounds 251 million last year, and for the first time had higher turnover than the parent group.

Last year the whole group reported pre-tax profits of Pounds 42.4 million, a rise of 13 per cent on the previous year.

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Intra-EU duty free is an extremely important contributor to Aer Rianta's bottom line and the company predicts sales from this line will contribute around Pounds 40 million to the group by 2000.