Adani to bid for duty-free shops at Macau airport

New Delhi: The Adani group plans to bid for setting up duty-free shops at the Macau international airport, as India’s largest airport operator spreads its wings overseas.

In a stock exchange filing, Adani Enterprises, the flagship firm of the conglomerate run by billionaire Gautam Adani, said it has completed the incorporation of a wholly-owned subsidiary, MTRPL Macau Ltd, in Macau on November 20. The subsidiary has been incorporated for the purpose of getting into the duty-free industry. “MML is incorporated for the purpose of bidding for duty-free liquor and tobacco shops at Macau International Airport,” it said.

Macau International Airport (MFM) in August launched an open tender for a duty-free liquor and tobacco services sub-concession. Bids close on November 29, according to the tender document. It said MFM is looking for an “operator to operate duty-free liquor and tobacco services, optionally with or without general merchandise retail services (but no perfume and cosmetics), with the defined subconcession areas at Macau International Airport.” Macau international airport has a design capacity to handle 6 million passengers per year. Adani’s ports-to-edible oil group has in recent years ventured into newer businesses including data centre, cement, telecom and media. It ventured into airport business in 2019, after it won operation and management contracts for six airports of Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Mangaluru, Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram.

Besides, it holds 73 per cent in Mumbai International Airport Ltd, which, in turn, holds 74 per cent in Navi Mumbai International Airport Ltd. With eight airports in its management and development portfolio, Adani Airport Holdings Ltd, a unit of Adani Enterprises, is the country’s largest airport infrastructure company, accounting for 25 per cent of passenger footfalls and 33 per cent of India’s air cargo traffic, according to its website. In recent months, Adani Airport has acquired AirWorks, the oldest air maintenance, repair and operations (MRO) firm in the country. It is also looking at taking over AI Engineering Services (AIESL), which is the MRO unit of Air India.