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The German airline group wants to avoid purchasing a controlling stake in TAP because it doesn’t require approval from European Union antitrust authorities.
Lufthansa is eyeing a 19.9% stake in TAP Air Portugal, according to Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, which cited two Portuguese institutional sources. The company’s CEO, Carsten Spohr, plans to travel to Lisbon this week to speak with government officials, said the report.
Portugal kicked off the sale process last September, and said it wanted to sell a 51% stake. It said it wanted an investor to grow TAP and its Lisbon hub, guarantee jobs, and bring additional flights to secondary airports in the country, including Porto.
According to the report in Corriere della Sera, Lufthansa wants to avoid purchasing a controlling stake in TAP so it won’t require approval from the European Commission.
Lufthansa, Air France-KLM and International Airlines Group — the owner of British Airways, Iberia and other airlines — have all previously expressed interest in TAP. The Portuguese carrier has been an attractive target for acquisition partly because its hub in Lisbon is ideal for Europe-Latin America connections, along with connectivity in Africa.
The airline can serve many of those transatlantic routes with cost-efficient narrowbody aircraft, particularly the Airbus A321LR that can fly as far as Belem in Brazil and Washington Dulles in the U.S. nonstop from Lisbon, Airline Weekly noted last September.
The German airline group recently received approval from the European Commission to acquire a 41% stake in ITA Airways. The European Commission said at the time that ITA’s ability to survive long-term “would have remained uncertain absent the transaction.”
Lufthansa is not expected to make an offer for TAP until early 2025. A 19.9% stake in TAP could be worth anywhere from €180 million ($199 million) to €200 million ($221 million), according to the report.
Lufthansa did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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