Infrastructure funds are positioning themselves to bid for a 49% stake in Newcastle International Airport, ahead of the transaction’s official launch, with some newcomers to the sector eyeing the asset.

Sources said that EQT Infrastructure and Arjun Infrastructure Partners are among the investors “closely monitoring” InfraBridge’s holding in the airport, adding that they are expected to submit an offer when the deal hits the market.

Both investors have conducted soft due diligence and traffic analysis over the summer, said the sources, with one of them adding that technical advisors have already been appointed for one of the two investors.

InfraBridge appointed earlier this year JPMorgan to prepare the sale of its stake in the airport, which is also owned by a group of local authorities.

Although sources have suggested that JPMorgan was planning to launch the transaction in September, the exact timeline remains unclear.

Some sources said that JPMorgan might bring the deal to the market after another sale – Macquarie’s and Ferrovial’s stake in AGS Airports – has been concluded.

For Arjun and EQT, a successful bid for Newcastle Airport would mark their breakthrough into the sector, as neither of them has an airport stake as of today, according to Infralogic data.

As with most airports, Newcastle Airport has also seen some recovery in passenger numbers and financials following the coronavirus pandemic.

For 2023, the InfraBridge-backed airport reported a record 4.9m passengers, while its EBITDA for 2022, the most recent year for which annual accounts are available, stood at GBP 33.7m, up by GBP 30.9m from 2021, a year severely hit by COVID-19. However, its EBITDA is still short of 2019 when it totalled GBP 41.3m.

The airport captures passengers in a large area and therefore faces less competition than say those in London, with Leeds Bradford Airport several hours away being the closest competitor.

Newcastle Airport paid dividend of GBP 51.6m for 2022 after no dividends were paid in 2021, according to the same accounts.

The sale of AGS is another major ongoing transaction in the market. Sell-side advisors Credit Agricole and Solomon Partners collected non-binding offers for the asset during the summer with Aena and AviAlliance among the bidders.

Late last year, Ardian and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund agreed to acquire a 15% stake in Heathrow from Ferrovial, while Global Infrastructure Partners also sold its stake in Edinburgh Airport to Vinci in April.

JPMorgan and Arjun declined to comment. EQT did not respond to a request for comment.