Aer Rianta and its German partner, Hoctief, have failed in their bid to buy a 50 per cent stake in Dusseldorf Airport. The rival bid from the German group, Harpen AG and its partner, US airport operator Airport Group International, is the favoured bidder for North Rhine-Westphalia's 50 per cent shareholding in the airport, the region's transport ministry has stated.

North Rhine-Westphalia transport minister, Mr Wolfgang Clement said that talks on the stake sale will, from now on, be exclusively with the Harpen consortium, which belongs to the German VEW utility group.

The rival consortium - consisting of the German builder, Hochtief and Aer Rianta remains the reserve, or "stand-by", candidate - the ministry said. Negotiations with the two parties continued until late on Monday, the ministry said, and the final details of the bid would be hammered out by the end of October.

The failure of the Aer Rianta bid will come as a major blow to the group's international expansion ambitions. Earlier this year, an Aer Rianta consortium failed in a bid for three Australian airports. Aer Rianta has been aiming to build its international airport management and non-EU duty free business in the face of the loss of duty free business within the EU in June 1999.