News & Stories

Singapore/Berlin. They are not ready to leave the accommodation service sector to Airbnb entirely yet: 9flats, the third largest provider among the Sharing Economy platforms up to now, purchased its competitor Wimdu – the number 2 so far. This way, Europe's largest portal with nearly 500,000 listed properties has been created. Roman Bach, Managing Director at 9flats, explains.

Frankfurt. Invisible for the guest, but certainly visible for the insider, a long-standing name is now set to disappear in the German hotel industry: Steigenberger Hotel Group will now become Deutsche Hospitality.

Paris. The French group is now hunting on hostel territory. AccorHotels announced the birth of its new brand JO&JOE this week. Dedicated to Millennials, it involves venues designed and equipped for them. A perfect marketing wrapping covering the plain message that AccorHotels now goes low budget – opening up another category in its brand pattern.

Goslar. "Families, who nurse their relatives at home, should also be able to go hiking and leave their patients in the care of the hotel during that time." This is part of the philosophy of the young operating group "carehotels" from Goslar. "The subject itself is complex and very detailed," as Managing Director Karina-Anna Doerschel has experienced since the project started three years ago. The first project, which is currently under construction, has been delayed; however, a second project has already been signed. Her idea is a balancing act between hotel services and nursing care services. But Doerschel has identified a promising niche.

Valetta/Malta. IBB Hotels has properties in Spain, Poland and Germany and is currently on course for expansion. The IBB Hotel in Ingelheim has just celebrated the completion of the building shell. The hotel is set to open in 2017. Further B and C destinations in Germany as well as A cities in Poland are on the cards. By 2020/21, the investor Sven von der Heyden and CEO Vladimir Saal hope to have more than doubled the number of IBB hotels to 20. At present, there are nine hotels in operation. The next three are set to open in 2017.

Berlin. The parking garage and hotel combo is nothing new. Though the form proposed by project developer MQ Real Estate in Berlin is quite unique. It focuses on expansion in a very specific way, adding hotels to parking decks. In Europe alone, 1,000 parking garages would be suitable. "We can add additional space to parking garages and car parks with wooden modules combined to form a fully-functional hotel," Managing Director Bjoern-M. Hiss says. Yesterday, a crane lifted the first hotel room module on to the upper storey of a parking garage in the Ring-Center 2 in Berlin-Lichtenberg. Nine projects are currently in the pipeline to be operated under the company's own brand, MyQuarter. And the first hotel groups have already shown an interest.

Rostock. Deutsche Hotel & Resort Holding continue to expand in the city hotel industry with the two successful brands HENRI and arcona LIVING: with new hotels in Berlin, Duesseldorf and Wetzlar.

Madrid. NH Hotels Group is facing a lawsuit from its largest shareholder, Chinese group HNA. The internal battle for power and control is still on. A Madrid court will soon decide if there is indeed a conflict of interest in this case and if HNA's board members can return…or not.

Berlin. Roland Paar and his development team are currently to be found in many destinations and hotels, pushing forward the Chinese Plateno Group, above all in German-speaking Europe. Behind the scenes though, another interesting project is taking shape: "Plateno Connect" – a distribution network for all European hoteliers looking to place offers directly in China. Plateno, currently one of the largest Chinese hotel group with over 3,700 hotels, focuses here on synergies with its existing booking platform as well as on customer loyalty through social media and third party reservation outlets. Roland Paar, Regional Vice President Europe, and Tomasz Janczak, Director of Distribution and eCommerce Europe, explain.

Vienna. At the very latest by this year's "Alpbach Economic Talks", digitalisation has arrived as a key issue in Austrian tourism. The future is to be secured with new support for 'Lighthouse Projects' and the rapid expansion of the 5G network. The EU has debated endlessly with respect to the latter - and as a result has been beaten by Korea. Korea's 5G network will go live in 2019 - with an important side-effect: Europe will be left behind economically.