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The partners hope to secure airport duty free business in the highly competitive Indian market | |
INDIA. French travel retailer Aelia and leading Indian travel services provider Bird Group have signed a memorandum of understanding to create a Special Purpose Vehicle to bid together for duty-free retail contracts in India.
As revealed by The Moodie Report earlier today, the pair were among those to have expressed interest in the Mumbai International Airport duty free tender.
Bird is a fast-growing Indian travel-to-IT group, which owns 13 companies.
Aelia Director of Business Development Ambroise Fondeur commented: “We are delighted to have reached an agreement with Bird, a company that shares our vision of the potential of duty free in India and whose aims are as ambitious as our own. The two groups offer highly complementary skills; our expertise in travel retail is matched by Bird’s knowledge of the Indian travel industry and its experience of doing business in the country. We are confident that together we can offer India’s airports a unique retail proposition.”
Bird Group Executive Director Gaurav Bhatia said: “With our extensive knowledge of the fields of travel and tourism it is a logical progression for us to move into travel retail. At the Bird Group we endeavour to give the very best to our clients and, through our partnership with Aelia, one of the world’s top travel retailers, we are sure that the end consumer will benefit from a great shopping experience.”
The Bird Group is one of the largest diversified groups in the fields of aviation, travel and technology. It is a conglomerate of independent companies.
For more information visit the Bird Group website at www.bird.in
MORE STORIES ON INDIAN DUTY FREE
Mumbai Airport Expressions of Interest attracts a who’s who of international retailers – 13/11/06
Mumbai Airport Expressions of Interest close tomorrow – 18/10/2006
Industry heavyweights line up as Delhi International duty free tender closes today – 18/10/06
India hands over control of Delhi and Mumbai airports to modernisers – 05/04/06
