Jumeirah to manage luxury hotel complex in Mauritius

21/05/2014
Dubai luxury hotel group Jumeirah has signed a deal to manage a 70-hectare luxury resort in Mauritius, as the emirate’s ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum revives his long-held strategy for building a global hospitality empire.
Jumeirah will open the resort in 2018, adding Mauritius to the two other tropical island resorts it operates in the Maldives.
Sheikh Mohammed has for years fixed on hospitality as a key sector to project Dubai on the world stage. That ambition was graphically illustrated in 2008 with the glitzy launch party attended by thousands of celebrities for the lavish Atlantis hotel on its palm tree-shaped artificial island.
But the resort came to symbolise the excesses that pushed the emirate to the brink of bankruptcy a year later.
Now, it is a barometer of the city’s renewed economic health, a magnet for tourists who hold up traffic to snap “selfies” in front of the imposing salmon-coloured structure looking out over the Gulf.

Sheikh Mohammed is reinvesting in hospitality to drive tourism to Dubai and to Dubai-owned entities like Jumeirah.
Dubai is targeting an additional 9m visitors to the 11m coming each year, ahead of its planned hosting of the World Expo in 2020.
Chinese visitors are becoming an increasingly important component, growing 11 per cent last year and matching the number of tourists coming from neighbouring Iran.
Gerald Lawless, Jumeirah chief executive, told the Financial Times Jumeirah was weighing up launching a contemporary four-star hotel brand under a different name, starting in Dubai and totalling “somewhere between 25 to 30 hotels”.
That is in addition to Jumeirah’s luxury range, which will spend $2.2bn to grow from 22 to 40 hotels by 2017, tracking the growth in destinations of Dubai’s airline, Emirates.
Sheikh Mohammed “always said that he wants to see Jumeirah in different parts of the world”, said Mr Lawless.
Jumeirah has five hotels in development in China, and as Emirates opens up flights to Africa Mr Lawless said he was “very bullish” about Jumeirah developing on that continent.
“Dubai Inc,” the emirate’s state-linked entities, is taking up stakes in other hospitality businesses. In December, the Investment Corporation of Dubai, a state holding company, bought the Atlantis from the investment arm of troubled Dubai World.
Then, last month, ICD bought a controlling stake in Kerzner International, the global resorts management firm founded by South African tycoon Sol Kerzner.
“ICD sees enormous potential in expanding the Kerzner footprint,” said Mohammed al-Shaibani, ICD’s chief executive and newly-appointed chairman of Kerzner, which initially developed the Atlantis in Dubai as a sister property to one in the Bahamas and is expanding into China.
Interest in hospitality investments come as tourism and aviation leads the emirate’s economic revival. The city has become a harbour from regional political unrest and remains a tax haven for the rich.
Analysts say other sovereign funds are considering a similar investment strategy to Dubai’s move into hospitality management.
“It gives these funds exposure to a large number of properties in an efficient way – a different proposition to those who just want some bricks and mortar,” said John Podaras, a Dubai-based partner at Hotel Development Resources, a hospitality consultancy.
One Abu Dhabi investment vehicle is looking to move into hotel management via organic growth.
Hakkasan Group, controlled by a prominent Abu Dhabi sheikh, has formed a joint-venture alliance with US-listed MGM to develop non-gaming resorts.
Starting life as a Chinese restaurant patronised by celebrities in London, Hakkasan has expanded to 13 locations and now plans to project its brand in resorts across locations such as New York, London, Dubai, Singapore and India.
“Abu Dhabi was specifically focused on creating a functional hotel company, but one that could compete on a world scale,” said Neil Moffitt, chief executive of Hakkasan Group. “Many hotels have fantastic rooms and locations, but dull food and beverage.”

By: ft.com

LEGGI GLI ALTRI BLOG

• < Prec
• Succ >