Government gives Parpública green light to invite the three interested companies to the second phase of TAP’s privatisation

The government has already authorised Parpública to invite the three interested groups to participate in the second phase of the sale of up to 49.9% of TAP, according to the Council of Ministers Resolution published on Wednesday in the Diário da República.

“Authorises PARPÚBLICA ― Participações Públicas (SGPS), S. A., to participate in the second stage of the reprivatisation process of Transportes Aéreos Portugueses, S. A., and to invite entities that have expressed interest and meet the requirements”, the document reads.

The public company in charge of managing the sale of 49.9% of the Portuguese airline received three expressions of interest by the deadline of 22 November – from the Air France-KLM, IAG (owner of Iberia and British Airways, among other companies) and Lufthansa – and on 12 December sent the Government the report on expressions of interest in the TAP privatisation process, meeting the deadline set in the specifications.

The Government recalled that the Council of Ministers analysed the technical report, “which concludes that all entities that expressed interest in participating in the privatisation process submitted their expressions of interest by the means and within the time limit set out in the Specifications and meet the participation requirements set out in Decree -Law No. 92/2025 of 14 August, as specified in the Specifications”.

It also stated that, according to Article 11(6) of the Specifications, “interested parties who have submitted a declaration of interest and demonstrated preliminary compliance with the requirements set out in Article 5(1) of the aforementioned Specifications are invited, by email, to submit a non-binding proposal”.

Second phase already involves price and plan

In this second phase, the purchase price (after due diligence on TAP’s accounts) and the industrial and strategic plan for the carrier will have to be detailed. Candidates will have 90 days to submit their proposals, and a new report from Parpública will be required.

The Government will then have to send a letter of invitation to candidates to submit binding proposals, who will have a further 90 days to submit their “application”. This will be followed by the selection of the winner, which the Government hopes will take place in the summer of next year.

“I think we should have an initial decision in July”, said Secretary of State for Transport Hugo Espírito Santo on 5 December during the 50th National Congress of the Portuguese Association of Travel and Tourism Agencies (APAVT), held in Macau.

The Executive may also opt for a direct negotiation process to obtain an improved final proposal.