Amadeus's founding airline ownership is slowly eroding away with confirmation that Air France-KLM wants a buyer for around half of its 15% stake in the company.
The airline group says 7.5% of its ownership (around 33.6 million shares) is on the table and at current market prices would be valued at around Euro 480 million ($640 million).
Air France-KLM says the result of the "private placement" will be announced as soon as possible, with Goldman Sachs and Santander acting as co-handlers for the sale.
A sale would put Air France-KLM's stake in line with Lufthansa and Iberia (IAG), the remaining two airline groups still involved with Amadeus.
Both have around 7.5% ownership in Amadeus. The current Amadeus board of directors own 0.16% of the company, with the lion's share (70%) in so-called free float following its IPO in Spain in 2010.
Air France-KLM's decision to sell half its stake will not come as a huge surprise given that it has recently embarked on a "ambitious three-year plan to restore profitability".
First set out in November 2011, the airline wants to cut costs, restructure its short and medium-haul network and reduce its debt burden.
The board wants to reduce its net debt by Euro 2 billion by the end of 2014.