The Purchase of Hunsrück Airport Hahn
Triwo AG, Trier – owned by Peter Adrian, the President of the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, who already counts four airfields among his portfolio – has acquired the insolvent Hunsrück Airport Hahn.
Dr Gerrit Strotmann, König Rechtsanwälte, advised Triwo AG in this purchase.
The insolvency estate was led by its insolvency administrator, Dr Jan Markus Plathner, partner at Brinkmann & Partner, and his partner colleague Christoph Enkler. The insolvency estate was advised by a team led by Dr Hendrik Boss, Taylor Wessing, Munich.
Dr Oliver Lorenz, MTJZ Frankfurt, acted as the notary public in the notarisation and all other notarial transactions involved from the beginning of the process.
A former US air base, it has been 30 years since Hahn Airport was given up by the US armed forces for civilian use, and it now stands as the only major commercial airport in the Rhineland-Palatinate region. All of the airport’s staff – around 400 employees – will be taken on by the new owner, with flight operations continuing.
The purchase ends a protracted stalemate that has continued since the airport’s bankruptcy in 2021, with the future of a crucial piece of transport infrastructure at stake. Following the insolvency, the Hahn Airport was sold to the Swift Conjoy investor group in Frankfurt at the end of June 2022. The asset was acquired at that time in an auction process involving ‘bidder showdown’ until directly before Dr Lorenz’s notarisation in Frankfurt. The deal ultimately fell through without Swift Conjoy paying the purchase price.
Following Swift Conjoy’s default, the second and third highest bidders signed notarised purchase agreements and transferred the purchase sum to a notarial escrow account without first obtaining permission from the creditors or an official license to operate. Finally, Triwo’s purchase agreement came into effect with a unanimous vote by the creditors.
