Destination report
BRISK BUSINESS IN BAVARIA 110
LUFTHANSA’S WIDE-RANGING restructuring programme has been extensively reported – a fairly drastic efficiency-drive designed to boost operating profits to more than €2 billion by 2015. However this hasn’t stopped it investing heavily in one of its key hubs, Munich airport. Lufthansa has a 40 per cent stake in the airport’s Terminal 2, which is used exclusively by the national carrier and its partners. Lufthansa is sharing a €650 million investment with the airport owner to build a new 125,000sq m T2 satellite, which will have gates for 27 aircraft and increase capacity by 11 million passengers per year (MPPA) – the main terminal having reached its limit of around 25 million MPPA. At the topping out ceremony last autumn, airport CEO Michael Kerkloh said the satellite, which is scheduled for completion in 2015, is designed with a built-in option for a second-phase
expansion that could further increase capacity to 17 million MPPA. Marianne Sammann is Lufthansa’s director of passenger sales management for southern Germany. She says the airline’s current winter timetable offers flights from Munich to 112 destinations in 44 countries. “Each week about 5,000 Lufthansa flights take off from, or land at, Munich,” she says, adding that this summer will see new routes to Mexico and Toronto. It seems business travel and meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (MICE) activity are helping drive demand for this added capacity. The Munich Convention Bureau reported some healthy statistics for the first ten months of 2013 – its monthly overnight stay figures averaged a 5.85 per cent year- on-year rise, while arrivals were up an encouraging 4 per cent.
MUNICH
With an airport revamp, top-notch convention facilities and the world's largest beer festival, could Munich be Germany’s ultimate MICE destination? Paul Revel reports
So who is doing business in
Munich? Lufthansa’s Sammann says top sectors for the city include finance, hi-tech and automotive. “Munich is also Germany’s number one location for the insurance industry,” she says. “And there are around 22,000 hi-tech companies based in the area.” She adds: “Munich is Germany’s
DAX capital [DAX refers to the 30 largest companies trading on the Frankfurt stock exchange]. It’s the city with the highest number of DAX companies in Germany, of which six are headquartered in the area. And SMEs [small- and medium-sized enterprises] in Munich grow at a rate of 23,000 new registrations a year.” The Munich Convention Bureau says growing source markets for MICE include China, India, the Asia-Pacific region and the US. The convention bureau offers support services to events planners, including help with the request for proposal (RFP) process, coordination, accommodation, and pre- and post-event excursions. The hotel sector is also noting healthy demand from the corporate sector. Jon West, UK managing director for hotel booking specialist HRS, says his research shows that the city’s leading international fairs, and popular events such as the Oktoberfest beer festival (see panel, right), mean reservations tend to be
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2014
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