Foreign owners for the Stade de France? It is a possibility “not to be ruled out, a priori”, according to the Minister of Sports and the Olympic Games Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, who affirmed it on Tuesday March 14 in the Senate. The state launched two procedures in parallel last week: either a sale or a concession because the current one ends in July 2025.
PSG, a club owned by Qatari shareholders (QSI), said it was going to apply for the takeover. Asked by centrist senator Laurent Lafon whether the French state, owner of the stadium, could sell this “sporting emblem” to “a structure belonging to a foreign state”, Amélie Oudéa-Castéra therefore did not. excluded.
If there “should be one who meets the protective conditions, which in the context of a transfer would in any case be fixed by law, or if this foreign investor were to participate in a group of operators, there is no there is no reason to dismiss it a priori and on principle, ”she said during the session of questions to the government in the Senate.
The offers studied in 2024
The Minister reiterated that the State was looking for “the best long-term project” by keeping “the sporting vocation of the stadium” and by “preserving the economic and financial interests of the State”. Asked also about the role of the football and rugby federations, she replied that they were “free to apply, free to associate with a candidate, free to negotiate the conditions of use of the stadium”. “What is important is that they can discuss with all the candidates in compliance with fairness and competition law,” she added.
The State published the two calls for tenders on March 7 with a date for the submission of the “folds” on April 27 at 12:00 p.m., according to the documents consulted by AFP, and includes among the conditions the need to “achieve a minimum base of works” in particular “ticketing and access control to doors, access gates, enclosure grilles, public information at door level, IT redundancy, video surveillance storage”.
The offers submitted, both for the transfer and for a concession, will be studied in 2024, for a probable award in 2025. Since 1995, it has been a consortium made up of the two French construction giants Vinci and Bouygues (respectively two thirds and ) which operates the stadium created for the 1998 Football World Cup. The price of the Stade de France is estimated at “647 million euros” according to the 2021 State account. But this is a strictly valuation accounting, in particular relating to construction and maintenance costs. The actual purchase value is, according to our information, less than this sum.