No less than eight international bidders are hotly pursuing Portuguese airport authority ANA-Aeroportos de Portugal SA, which is currently up for sale.

These eight bidding parties reportedly including Global Infrastructure Partners which, in October 2009, acquired the former London Gatwick Airport from BAA and now also owns Edinburgh Airport, after obtaining it from the same source five months ago.

Also apparently in the running are BAA's owner, Spain's Ferrovial and Fraport, which is said to have entered a partnership with IFM for the purposes of this purchase.

As far as value is concerned, the ANA airport bids are thought to all be around the $2.1bn mark, based on the eight-times-earnings pattern that's emerged from other recent airport authority purchase deals.

This valuation, though, will be influenced by the future of national carrier TAP Portugal, which is also up for sale and has its home-base at Lisbon Portela Airport, one of eight managed by ANA's alongside Beja Airport, Faro Airport, Flores Airport, Horta Airport, Joao Paulo II Airport, Francisco de Sa Carneiro (Porto) Airport and Santa Maria Airport.

TAP Portugal itself is currently heavily in debt and, likely as a result, only very limited interest has been shown in it so far. Its financial status mirrors that of Portugal as a whole but, even so, ANA was actually more profitable than ever in 2011, earning over 76 million Euros as a result of its eight airports handling some 30 million passengers in total.

The Portuguese airports sale is taking place to help the country receive a multi-million Euro aid package from the IMF and EU. In other words, if it wants this financial help, it has to privatise its airports.

Legally-binding ANA-Aeroportos de Portugal SA bids may now be requested by the start of December, with the Portuguese government then potentially able to finalise a deal by the year's end or temporarily transfer control of ANA to a private firm, which could later itself move to acquire it.

Airport International will revisit this subject in future news coverage.

Image copyright Ex13 - Courtesy Wikimedia Commons