King Power, which operates duty-free shops at Suvarnabhumi airport, has maintained its hold there by winning a new round of bids to operate duty-free shops and the commercial zone at the airport.
The bid envelopes for both schemes were unsealed by Airports of Thailand Plc (AoT) yesterday.
Senior executive vice-president of AoT, Wichai Bunyu, said King Power was the overall winner taking into account the proposal and technical elements for the operation of duty-free shops.
"The results would be proposed to a committee responsible for assessing them on June 12 and presented to the AoT board on June 19," Mr Wichai said.
According to him, the technical aspects of the proposals have a weighted score of 80 with the remaining 20 governing the bid prices.
He said King Power, whose current duty-free licence is set to expire in September of next year, had the best proposal and surpassed all other scores received by the AoT. Moreover, King Power's proposal is beyond the level AoT had expected, he noted.
Regarding the licence to run duty-free shops, King Power was competing with two bidders -- a venture between Bangkok Airways (BA) Plc and South Korea's Lotte, and another formed by Royal Orchid Hotel (Thailand) Plc, or ROH, and its UK partner.
Vitavas Vibhagool, CEO of Grande Asset Hotels and Property Plc (GRAND), a major shareholder of ROH, said the ROH and its UK partner scored around 70.
It trailed the BA-led consortium, which scored around 80, as well as King Power, which scored about 90, according to him.
"I am sad and it is a pity that we didn't win this bid," said Mr Vitavas. "We lost a chance to do good things for Thailand and the AoT."
He said his venture will write to the AoT to seek details about how the scores were given.
Of total sales of about 28 billion baht a year at duty-free operations in four airports operated by the AoT -- Suvarnabhumi, Phuket, Hat Yai and Chiang Mai, 82% of all sales are generated at Suvarnabhumi airport.
AoT has separated bidding contracts between Suvarnabhumi and the other three airports but criticism remains about the process being a monopoly as duty-free at Suvarnabhumi dominated the revenues.
Regarding the contract to develop the airport's commercial zone, Mr Wichai said King Power, which submitted the best offer, scored higher than its competitor, Central Pattana Plc (CPN).
According to him, King Power offered higher than the minimum annual guarantee of the 2-billion-baht level set in the current contract, while its promised revenue sharing of 15% remains in the same.
Citing the proposal, he said there will be an overhaul of the operation at the airport's commercial zone, ranging from shop decorations to the management of operations.
Referring to the bid to run duty-free shops at regional airports -- Phuket, Hat Yai and Chiang Mai, Mr Wichai said four groups have expressed interest in buying bid envelopes. The bidders will be required to submit the envelopes on June 4.
The reported potential bidders are King Power, BA, ROH and Central Department Store Co.
The AoT earlier said the results will be announced on June 10.
