The First St. Regis Opens in Malaysia

Starwood Hotels & Resorts announced on April 6, the arrival of its luxury brand to Langkawi. The opening of St. Regis Langkawi marks the first luxury resort opening in Langkawi in a decade and the brand’s first property opening in Malaysia. The all-suite luxury resort offers four private over-water villas and 85 well-appointed suites; it also features a 8,600 ft2 brand’s signature Iridium Spa, as well as 10,000 ft2 of event spaces. 

Accor Acquires Onefinestay

Europe’s largest hotel operator, AccorHotels, has acquired online home-sharing startup Onefinestay for  €148 million. On top of that, the hotel company has pledged to invest an additional €64 million to help the London-based company  scale its platform to cover 40 new cities over the next five years. The online platform currently hosts 2,600 up-market property listings in London, Paris, Rome, Los Angeles and New York City. Onefinestay will continue to operate as an independent unit within Accor. Greg Marsh, co-founder and CEO of Onefinestay expects to leverage on Accor’s extensive distribution channels and loyalty programs in the long run to grow its customer base. With its primary market demand segment lying in groups and families, with lengths of stay exceeding four days, Onefinestay will serve to compliment Accor’s traditional hotel offerings. Through this strategic acquisition, Accor has allegedly made its stand in confronting competition in the online sharing-economy while also expanding in the upscale market.

HNA to Buy Tysan Stake from Blackstone for $340 Million

Chinese conglomerate HNA Group has agreed to buy a controlling stake in Tysan Holdings Ltd. for about $340 million to expand in construction and property development, prompting shares of the target company to jump to the highest level in 25 years. HNA will pay HK$2.62 billion ($340 million), or HK$4.53 a share, to an arm of Blackstone Group LP for a 66 percent stake in Tysan, the construction company said in a filing to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The price is about 11 percent more than Tysan’s closing level on March 31. Trading was suspended on April 1. The acquisition would help HNA, the owner of Hainan Airlines as well as hotel, infrastructure, logistics and aviation-maintenance businesses, extend its foothold outside mainland China after agreeing to buy a stake in Brazilian airline Azul Linhas Aereas Brasileiras SA and acquiring airport luggage handler Swissport International Ltd. for about $2.7 billion. China has urged its companies to expand overseas to improve competitiveness, resulting in $97 billion in deals in the first quarter.

Tourism Authority of Thailand will Open a New Office in Prague

Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) plans to open a new office in Prague to tap the potential of the Eastern European market, including Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Ukraine. Scheduled to open in August, the new TAT office in Prague will join the TAT’s current network of 35 offices in Thailand and 27 offices overseas. According to Yuthasak Supasorn, TAT Governor, “We have seen the prospective sign and a strong growth in Eastern Europe. So, the office in Prague has been established to specifically oversee this growing market in order to uphold Thailand as a quality gateway to tourists in this region.” In 2015, there were 364,967 visitor arrivals from the Eastern European market to Thailand. This market recorded total earned revenue of 637 million Euros for the Thai tourism industry, an increase of 9.7% from the previous year.

Hotel Openings in India This Week

InterContinental Hotels Group opened two Holiday Inn Expresses this week – on Old Mahabalipuram Road (OMR), Chennai, and at the International Airport Terminal (T3), New Delhi. The Holiday Inn Express, OMR, Chennai features 136 rooms and is proximate to IT Parks and dedicated Special Economic Zones (SEZ) located along the OMR stretch. The Holiday Inn Express at the International Airport Terminal T3 in New Delhi offering 93 rooms, is easily accessible from both domestic and international terminals.
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts opened the Hyatt Regency in Chandigarh, its first hotel in the city. The hotel is located 20 minutes away from Chandigarh International Airport and eight minutes from the Chandigarh Junction railway station and is part of a premium development that includes the Elante Mall and an office complex that houses key multi-national companies and diplomatic missions. The property offers 211 guest rooms, including 25 suites and seven Cabana rooms. The hotel also features five restaurants and bars and more than 36,000 ft2 of meeting and event space, including a ballroom measuring 8,711 ft2.
Hilton Worldwide announced the opening of its first Conrad hotel in India in Pune. Located on Mangaldas Road near Koregaon Park, the hotel is owned by Palm Grove Beach Hotels Pvt. Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of the K. Raheja Constructions Group. The property features 310 rooms including 20 suites, six food and beverage outlets and extensive meeting and banquet space.

2016: Hotel Valuation Index (Asia Pacific – Select Markets)

The Hotel Valuation Index (HVI) combines the various factors affecting the economy and region at large with hotel-market specific demand and supply dynamics to derive indicative values and future growth trends. For this edition of the HVI, HVS analysed 32 top hotel markets in 13 countries across the Asia Pacific region with a total inventory of approximately 332,000 rooms in the mid market and higher space (four star plus). The idea of combining 32 markets, with different maturities into one index, was not to pit them against one other, but to bring out individual characteristics and differentiators. In today’s day and age, while each market has its unique dynamics, opportunities and challenges, the effects of global environment cannot be undermined. The indicative values, therefore, would not bear comparison to actual transactions. However, this is the best approach to retain the integrity of HVI as a rolling index. VIEW FULL STORY

Absolute Share Price Performance, as on 7 Aprl 2016