News & Stories
Munich. The second Corona year 2021 also shows the deep cuts in the German city hotel industry in the Motel One balance sheet. The management is stringently continuing the expansion, if possible with XXL properties in absolute premium locations. There are enough investor enquiries. The group was able to compensate for the first loss of staff. Energy costs are not much of a problem. The two co-CEOs are also flirting with segment expansions.
Vienna. Pure summer season businesses are currently doing very well in Austria, hotels with two strong seasons well, pure winter hotels satisfactory at best, city hotels extremely modest. Equity capital has been destroyed, and 60,000 beds should disappear from the market. Where are solutions?
London. Leisure, Leisure, Bleisure. Marriott International is betting heavily on this in 2022. The world's largest chain wants to quickly adapt to the new traveller, who will permanently change his behaviour in the future. Business is becoming an appendage of leisure.
Berlin. As a former overnight capital and top trade fair and event location, Berlin has stumbled badly since 2020. Against this background, the President of the German Hotel and Restaurant Association Berlin, Christian Andresen, thinks that the renewed cancellation of the ITB was a mistake and that Berlin needs a restart for the trade show. He is counting on the new state government and its New Start programme. Even the dream of the most modern hotel management school in Germany might even come true.
Amsterdam. A new 50-strong pan-European team and an EMEA CEO who comes from Asia-Pacific are to better position Choice Hotels in and after the crisis. First, the franchisor is refreshing its three strongest brands in the region. Then he talks about a performance push but does not reveal much. The CEO is still testing the European ground in terms of brand roll-out as well as the adoption of technology solutions. Jonathan Mills about his plans and learnings.
Bangkok. The ascent of Minor Hotels started about 15 years ago with 12 hotels of the Anantara brand primarily located in Thailand. The next destination on the list was the Maldives. But then the management decided to pursue first opportunistic acquisitions. Minor became a global player itself – through the surprising acquisition of the NH Hotel Group. Dillip Rajakarier, since 2007 with the group and Group CEO for one year now, is a deal maker who has a lively temperament, mental flexibility and a fine instinct for special opportunities.
Munich. The future belongs to the metaverse: We will live in a mixed reality: The real and digital world will blend to such an extent that we shall find ourselves disconnecting rather than connecting. The data jungle will increase but will also provide positive and useful features due to open data, and it will free us from the power of large tech giants, for example. Travelling will become more valuable and precious, and hotels will be able to do without walls in future. Today, news from the future is provided by 2b AHEAD, the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute as well as the future researchers Matthias Horx, Andreas Reiter and Horst Opaschowski.
Berlin/Vienna. The second Corona year, 2021, was again modest and remains extremely sober and partly bitter in its forecasts for 2022. MRP Consult Vienna and Berlin with a compact summary.
Munich. In view of climate change, feeding the world's population is becoming an even bigger global problem than before. Genetic engineering and food cultures can provide a remedy. Even the first Germans could imagine consuming "Cultured Meat" in the future.
Augsburg. Industrial robots have experienced a rapid increase in number. Professional service robots as well. Most service robots come from Europe, where demand is also growing from the hospitality industry. One robot removes 60 kilos of empty dishes on each run in the restaurant, another interacts with humans in real time via voice recognition, others work as fast as three and a half bartenders or will soon replace the night porter.