BAA announces contract award for its £500 million media sales concession

23 May 2006

Media@baa, the in-house owner of BAA’s advertising portfolio, announced today that JCDecaux Airport is to be awarded the contract for its media account. The sale of media over the term of the contract is expected to raise revenues of £500 million from which BAA receives the majority of the revenues and JCDecaux receives a fee structured to incentivise performance.

The new contract, due to start in April 2007, has a term of seven years with an option for BAA to extend by three years. It is designed to continue the development of innovative media alongside traditional formats to reflect BAA’s position as a world leader in out-of-home media.

Brands utilising the numerous media opportunities at BAA’s seven UK airports will be exposed to an audience with a unique profile which is clearly defined, affluent and diverse comprising over 140 million passengers a year.

The opening of Heathrow’s Terminal 5 in March 2008 will also add many spectacular and innovative opportunities for brands to reach the growing airport audience, forecast to reach over 200 million a year by 2017.

Stephen Nelson, BAA Retail Director, comments: “It has been an exciting and thorough process and we’ve been extremely impressed with all the submissions. Whilst it was a close run competition, JCDecaux Airport emerged as the strongest candidate and we are looking forward to working with them to further push the boundaries in what media can achieve at BAA, particularly with the exciting opportunities coming at Terminal 5.”

Commenting on this award, Jean-François Decaux, Chairman of the Board and Co-Chief Executive Officer at JCDecaux adds: “We are delighted that we will be able to build on our successful relationship with BAA. This is a long-term partnership and comes at a very exciting time with the opening of Terminal 5 only two years away and the potential subsequent development of Heathrow East. This unique opportunity will enable us to bring to market many new innovative channel and sponsored services, and create a new digital showcase across BAA’s seven UK airports.”

Notes to Editors
The short-list comprised five sales companies: JCDecaux Airport, Clear Channel, Eye Corp, Maiden and Viacom - all of which were invited to submit a formal tender to BAA.

The announcement follows an extensive Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) compliant five month tender process. BAA is required to comply with procurement rules which apply to certain utilities and companies operating in defined sectors.

The process to appoint a media partner followed two stages. Firstly, a six week pre-qualification process following the posting of the OJEU notice to ensure that only companies capable of fulfilling the contract were invited to the two-stage tender, and secondly, the tender process involved a formal presentation to a BAA selection panel, comprising of senior management drawn from various commercial teams within the BAA Retail business.

The selection criteria were designed to identify a company that would work alongside BAA to fully exploit the unique, premium audience and continue to improve the performance of the BAA media portfolio.

The selection process covered the following criteria:
• Financial submission based on margins for traditional and innovative media, and guaranteed minimum annual payments

• Company capability and experience, covering the company’s background, vision, mission and operational excellence

• Company management and staffing structure, covering the senior management, sales, marketing and operational resource dedicated to the BAA account

• The company’s business development, marketing and partnership strategies, with an emphasis on the introduction of new and innovative media products.

Leading the world in travel retail
Through its seven UK airports and further operations at 12 other airports across the world, BAA is a world leader in airport retail. Reaching over 140 million passengers per year at its UK airports.

Contact Information

Kate Johansen-Berg

Kavanagh Communications

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