The IAG group, the parent company of Iberia, is considering buying the Portuguese airline TAP , currently valued at around 960 million euros. It should be noted that this group is not the only one that wants to acquire the Portuguese operator, since Air France-KLM and Lufthansa are also interested in bidding for it.
However, according to experts at the Airline Economics forum, IAG is the favorite to acquire TAP, due on the one hand to its strategic interest in expanding its routes with Latin America: let us remember that TAP has a significant operation in Brazil, with destinations that IAG does not currently fly to, such as Recife, Fortaleza, Belem, Natal or Porto Alegre. On the other hand, the strategic value of the Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport hub for IAG is also very important, as its growth could be consolidated as a base for a possible “multi-hub” with two important bases for connections with Latin America: Madrid and Lisbon.
Although the operation has yet to be finalized, as the Portuguese government has not yet announced the percentage at which TAP would be privatized, this analysis confirms the strength of the aviation sector in our country, whose air traffic grew by no less than 9.2% in the past year 2024, reaching the figure of 309,332,069 passengers in the AENA airport network.
