The insolvent Hunsrück Airport Hahn has a new owner. The Trierer Triwo AG of the President of the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, Peter Adrian, bought the former US air base. This was announced by the Hahn insolvency administrator Jan Markus Plathner. The real estate developer Triwo, which is represented at 30 locations nationwide, offered the highest purchase price. The sum, the amount of which remained secret, had already been transferred to an escrow account.
A long stalemate comes to an end with the still fresh signature on the purchase contract: The airport went bankrupt in autumn 2021 and then repeatedly made headlines – first with a failed deal, then with bidders who did not want the creditors. Until Adrian, who already has four airfields in his portfolio and is a pilot himself, entered the race.
Employees breathe easy
Important messages from the insolvency administrator on day one of the restart: All of the approximately 400 employees at the only major commercial airport in Rhineland-Palatinate will be taken over by the investor. And: Flight operations will continue. It has been 30 years since the US armed forces handed over the faucet for civilian use.
The employees breathed a sigh of relief: “The works council is pleased that the impasse is over. And the works council is pleased that a very solid company has made the race,” said the lawyer for the Hahn works council, Georg Wohlleben, of the dpa.
The Triwo group of companies, founded in Trier in 1972, wants to give Hahn a boost: “We rate the future prospects of Frankfurt-Hahn Airport as good,” said Triwo boss Adrian. “That’s why we want to make targeted investments in the airport infrastructure, achieve further growth in passenger and freight traffic and implement sustainable real estate development.”
Buyer enjoys “high reputation in business and politics”
The advance praise for the 66-year-old and his company is great. According to the insolvency administrator, the creditors voted unanimously for the new buyer at all meetings. Plathner admitted that the other bidders who had recently taken part had also led the airport “into a good future”. “Ultimately, the amount of the purchase price was decisive.”
The Rhineland-Palatinate Economics Minister Daniela Schmitt (FDP) said that Adrian enjoyed “a high reputation in business and politics”. With Triwo as a buyer, “the best conditions” have been created to lead the rooster into a good future.
This is urgently needed, since the airport, where night flights are allowed, has experienced many lows since 2016. Rhineland-Palatinate sold its former 82.5 percent stake in the airport to the Chinese conglomerate HNA in 2017 for around 15 million euros. But later he got into financial difficulties. The state of Hesse still holds 17.5 percent of the airport.
A deal already burst in 2022
After the insolvency of HNA, the majority of the rooster was sold to the investor group Swift Conjoy GmbH in Frankfurt at the end of June 2022. However, they did not pay the purchase price – so the deal fell through. After the failure of Swift Conjoy, the bidders with the second and third highest bids came into focus: the Nürburgring holding company NR Holding around the Russian entrepreneur Viktor Charitonin and the Mainz real estate group Richter.
Both signed a purchase contract and transferred the purchase price to an escrow account – but did not get the green light from the creditors and no license for flight operations. In February, Plathner then surprisingly started the investor process.
“But it is gratifying that a German investor who has also gained experience in operating airports in Hesse has found Hahn,” said Finance Minister Michael Boddenberg (CDU). “This infrastructure does not belong in Russian hands. It’s good that this access could be averted.”
Triwo AG is present at around 30 locations nationwide – with large industrial and commercial parks that the group develops and leases to companies. The group with more than 200 employees also includes four airfields in Egelsbach (Hesse), in Oberpfaffenhofen (Bavaria), Zweibrücken (Palatinate) and Mendig (Mayen-Koblenz district) as well as manufacturer-independent car test centers.
