History
The British Airports Authority was established by the passing of Airport Authority Act 1965, to take responsibility for three state-owned airports - London Heathrow Airport, London Gatwick Airport, and London Stansted Airport. In the following few years, the authority acquired responsibility for Glasgow International Airport, Edinburgh Airport, Southampton Airport and Aberdeen Airport. The Authority took on the Ministry of Civil Aviation Constabulary in 1946, which was renamed to become the British Airports Authority Constabulary, and was disbanded between 1974 and 1975.
As part of Margaret Thatcher's moves to privatise government owned assets, the Airports Act 1986 was passed which mandated the creation of BAA plc as a vehicle by which stock market funds could be raised. The initial capitalisation of BAA plc was £1,225 million. In the early 1990s, the company sold Prestwick International Airport (now known as Glasgow Prestwick Airport).
In December 2005, BAA made a winning bid of £1.2 billion for a 75% stake in Budapest Ferihegy International Airport, the largest airport in Hungary, which was being privatised by the Hungarian government. In July 2006, BAA was taken over by a consortium led by Grupo Ferrovial, following a bid which valued the company at £10.1 billion ($20 billion). As a result, the company was delisted from the London Stock Exchange (where it had previously been part of the FTSE100 index) on 15 August 2006, and the company name was subsequently changed from BAA plc to BAA Limited. Following the take-over, the decision was made to sell the stake in Ferihegy and this was completed in June 2007, when a consortium led by Hochtief AirPort of Germany purchased the stake.
As a major client of the UK construction industry, it is a member of the Construction Clients' Group, which represents client views to the government's Strategic Forum for Construction.
BAA expanded into international operations, including retail contracts at Boston Logan International Airport and Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport (through its subsidiary BAA USA, Inc.), and a management contract with the City of Indianapolis to run the Indianapolis International Airport (as BAA Indianapolis, Inc.) before ultimately selling off its US division to Prospect Capital Corporation in July 2010.
In October 2012, the company announced a rebrand from BAA Limited to Heathrow Airport Holdings Ltd, with each individual airport operating under its own name rather than the BAA banner.
Read more about this topic: Heathrow Airport Holdings Limited
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