Business

Monday February 6, 2012

KLIA2 concessionaire awards by July

By LEONG HUNG YEE
hungyee@thestar.com.my


KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) will be awarding the concessionaires for 225 outlets at KLIA2 by July this year for a scheduled opening in April 2013, according to senior general manager commercial services Faizah Khairuddin.

“We are currently accepting tenders for 27 outlets until Jan 26. We're doing it zone by zone and we will award by July this year because everything has to be ready for opening by April 2013. Some 500 people have expressed interest to operate at KLIA2,” Faizah told StarBiz.

Of the 225 outlets, 118 lots have been allocated for retail offerings, 81 lots for food and beverages (F&B) and 26 lots for services.

Faizah: ‘It is a very unique concept.’

Faizah said MAHB received overwhelming response from interested parties for space at KLIA2 when it conducted a brand preview presentation for KLIA2 last month.

“We received very good response at our KLIA2 brand preview and had to limit the number of participants to 800 because the room could not accommodate more people,” she said, adding that the tender would be done in an open and transparent manner.

Faizah explained that MAHB already had an idea of what range of shops it wanted to operate at KLIA2, for example coffee-based products in certain areas. She said MAHB had set up a website (www.klia2retail.com.my) to provide all the details needed for tenderers to forecast their respective business plans.

Faizah said that apart from the airside retail outlets at KLIA2, MAHB was also working on the details for a landside mall in front of KLIA2. However, the landside mall will not be a duty-free one. She said the mall would be an integrated complex where it would be a point of convergence.

Airports are divided into landside and airside areas where the former is basically the area before immigration while the latter is the area after immigration.

“We will anchor it with retail offering. It is very a unique concept ... not just an airport. We will have both airside and landside malls for passengers,” she said.

Faizah said the landside mall would have contemporary duplexes retail offering and it would be good for its concessionaires. She said the ground floor of the outlet could be a bookstore and there would be a cafe.

“We are maximising space as part of our plan to drive our non-aeronautical revenue. KLIA2 is commercially driven,” she said.

MAHB no longer just rents out space but also supports and increases the vibrancy of its airport for concessionaires.

“Under our Runway to Success business plan, we target revenue to hit RM3bil by 2014, of which RM2bil will be contributed by non-aeronautical while the balance of RM1bil will be from aeronautical.

“Currently, non-aeronautical revenue is about 55% with the balance 45% from aeronautical,” Faizah said.

She said that in a traditional airport model, non-aeronautical revenue accounted for about 30%, with 70% from aeronautical. “We want to reverse the equation.”

Growing its commercial services such as rental of space, car park and airside transit hotel is one of the ways for MAHB to increase its non-aeronatical revenue, which has been growing in recent years.

In the financial year ended Dec 31, 2003 (FY03), MAHB's non-aeronautical revenue stood at RM486mil but it has since grown significantly to RM842mil in FY10.

According to the KLIA Aeropolis Master Plan, MAHB has identified 2,730 acres out of a total of 22,156 acres in KLIA for commercial development.

MAHB also targets to achieve RM185.5mil in property development revenue by 2014.

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