Niki Lauda to buy assets of Niki airline

VIENNA, Jan 23 (AFP): Austrian former racing driver Niki Lauda has been selected to buy the assets of Niki, the airline he founded in 2003, the administrators of the former Air Berlin subsidiary said Tuesday.

Lauda's bid was preferred over Anglo-Spanish group IAG/Vueling. It was the third offer the former Formula One driver had made since September for Niki -- formerly a unit of now bankrupt Air Berlin, and most recently operated by Lufthansa.

"At the end of a transparent tender, (the company) Laudamotion GmbH came out early in the morning as the best bidder," Niki's Austrian and German administrators said in a brief joint statement.

No details of the transaction have been revealed so far.

Lauda sold the airline to Air Berlin in 2011. The administrators had specified the need for a swift green light from the authorities of the two countries for finalisation of the deal.

At the end of December IAG announced that it had been selected, as part of Air Berlin's liquidation procedure, to purchase "up to 15 A320 aircraft and a portfolio of attractive slots" owned by Niki.