Heathrow Airport is one of Europe’s leading airports, connecting the UK to the world and serving roughly 80 million passengers every year. Ardian is a world-leading private investment house, managing or advising $176 billion of assets on behalf of more than 1,720 clients globally.

Ardian commissioned a NERA team led by Director Dominik Huebler and Managing Director James Grayburn to conduct regulatory due diligence of Heathrow Airport. The NERA team analyzed the regulatory framework, covering the determination of the allowed return, the definition of the asset base and capex, opex and commercial revenue determination and incentives, regulatory traffic forecasting, various other elements of regulatory revenue determination, and more. The NERA team also supported Ardian’s financial advisors in developing the financial model and provided comparisons of the regulatory framework to other infrastructure sectors.

NERA advised Ardian on these key issues during the regulator’s development of the final determination and advised Ardian on the prospects and modelling of the various ensuing appeals relating to cost of capital, traffic forecasting, capex incentives, and various COVID-related issues.

On 12 December 2024, Ardian announced it had completed the acquisition of a 22.6% stake in FGP Topco Ltd, the holding company for Heathrow Airport Holdings Ltd, from Ferrovial SE and certain other TopCo shareholders.

NERA experts regularly advise on transactions in the transport and other infrastructure sectors, providing regulatory due diligence advice on airports, toll roads, rail, and other infrastructure.

The full NERA consulting team comprised Mr. Huebler, Mr. Grayburn, Director Lorenz Wieshammer, Senior Consultant/Principals Niko Czaplicki and Jim Yin, Consultant Tarek Badrakhan, Economic Analyst Daniel Neuhold and Research Officers Shreya Gupta and Lucas Skrabal, and former colleagues Philipp Hiemann, Eric Wimmer, Mai Wang, Nina Schnyder, and Ludovic Nicoud.