News & Stories
Zurich. Credit Suisse Real Estate Fund LivingPlus acquired the Hotel Giardino including its spacious spa in Ascona in Switzerland's Ticino on 10th November 2008.
Bern. 250,000 people visited "Westside", the new shopping and leisure time mall in Bruennen near Bern, Switzerland, within the first three days after the opening. It consists of a shopping mall with 55 shops, enclosed by an adventure pool including spa, a fitness park, restaurants, a hotel and a multiplex cinema. All that had been planned by Migros, the largest Swiss commercial enterprise, and it was realised within three years. Cost: 500 million Swiss francs. Top-class architect: the American Daniel Libeskind. The hotel: a Holiday Inn.
Munich. Timeless and casual - right in line with Levi's cult jeans. With these two attributes, the "25hours Frankfurt tailored by Levi's" convinced the jury and won the "Hotel Property Award 2008". The award was presented in the course of the Hotel Development Conference "hotelforum" in Munich last week.
Dresden. Investor Dieter Bock is to sell the building "Am Zwinger" for which there are plans for InterContinental to take up residence in the next few years. The prominent building situated in Dresden's city centre was sold through Octavian Holding. At the same time, the reclusive entrepreneur officially announced how he will proceed in respect of the renovation of the Kempinski Atlantic Hotel Hamburg.
Frankfurt. Deka Immobilien GmbH has commissioned Hochtief Property Management GmbH, Essen, and DeTeImmobilien, Deutsche Telekom Immobilien und Service GmbH, Frankfurt, to carry out the property management of 220 properties in Germany beginning on January 1, 2009. This also includes the hotels of Deka.
London. The InterContinental Hotels Group forms a strategic alliance with The Family of Orange Lake Resorts to create a new timeshare brand, Holiday Inn Club Vacations.
Augsburg. Hotels caught in three-way contractual relationships between owner, lessee and franchisor are encountered increasingly often. Rapidly expending hotel groups concentrate all their efforts on their brand, leaving the day to day running of the hotel up to third parties. Grand City Hotels and Resorts is the biggest franchise partner of Accor Hotellerie Germany and Leonardo uses well known brands in order to build up its own brand network The parties involved have different motives for getting involved in such a ménage à trois.
Augsburg. Up until mid-July it was the Choice Hotel Kassel Melsungen, now it`s an Ibis. The 99 room retreat is operated as 2 star hotel, though not by Accor directly, but by Grand City Hotels and Resorts. Such constellations meanwhile turn up more and more often: three way relationships involving the owner the hotel operator and third party, often a less well known partner, that assumes the role of lessee. The reason for the growth of such arrangements is the unpopularity of the lease. "The trend is growing throughout the whole of Europe," PKF hotelexperts have observed in Vienna, "above all in the eastern European markets, such relationships play a significant role." All the same, this kind of ménage a trois is not without its problems.