Kumho Group said on April 15 that it has decided to sell Asiana Airlines. Kumho said, “It has been working on the best way to normalize Asiana Airlines' operations and believed that selling Asiana Airlines would restore market confidence to both the group and Asiana Airlines.”
Kumho Asiana Group will proceed with the sale process by selecting the managers and preferred bidders for the sale of Asiana Airlines in the future.
Park Sam-koo, former chairman of Kumho Asiana Group, and his son Park Se-chang, president of Asiana IDT, met with Lee Dong-gul, chairman of the KDB, to express their intention.
Kumho Asiana Group earlier asked its creditors on April 10 to provide 500 billion won on collateral for the Park family's entire stake in Kumho Buslines, but creditors rejected the request.
Asiana Airlines has been experiencing a liquidity crisis, including the repayment of corporate bonds worth 60 billion won, due on April 25.
With Asiana Airlines being put on the market for sale, there is a high possibility that South Korean conglomerates such as SK Group, Hanwha Group, CJ Group and Aekyung Group will jump into the takeover race.
If Asiana Airlines is sold, Kumho Asiana Group's assets will fall to the 4 trillion won level. The figure is less than the 60th largest in the business community.
Kumho Asiana Group acquired Daewoo Engineering & Construction in 2006 and Korea Express in 2008. At that time, the group was ranked seventh in the business rankings with 26 trillion won in assets.
However, the group's management was handed over to the state-run KDB in 2009 as it failed to overcome the global financial crisis and its financial structure deteriorated as a result of the excessive business expansion.
