Dubai’s Emaar Hospitality Group expects to open 35 hotels and serviced residences within about five years as it expands at home and abroad.
The new hotels will encompass its luxury Address Hotels and Resorts brand and the upscale Vida Hotels and Resorts as well as the midscale Rove Hotels.
They include the first Address beach resort in Fujairah and others in Egypt, Istanbul and Bahrain. Its flagship The Address Downtown Dubai hotel has been closed since New Year’s Eve, when a massive fire swept up the facade of the skyscraper as millions of TV viewers watched events unfold live.
The group said the fire would not have any “negative impact” on its balance sheet but added that it did not expect it would reopen this year.
Emaar Properties included a Dh301 million writedown when it posted its fourth-quarter earnings in February because of the blaze.
“The first quarter has been positive year-on-year and the overall [revenue per available room] is still forecasted to be strong,” said Chris Newman, the corporate director of operations for Emaar Hospitality Group.
The hospitality division contributed 12 per cent of Emaar’s revenues last year, at Dh1.64 billion.
Emaar Hospitality operates four hotels and two serviced residences in Dubai under The Address Hotels and Resorts brand and two hotels under Vida Hotels and Resorts.
The company will roll out its new Rove Hotels brand, developed as a joint venture with Meraas, a Dubai-based holding company, this year.
The 422-room Rove Downtown Dubai is scheduled to open in May next to The Dubai Mall. This year, it expects to open Rove Port Saeed and Rove Oud Metha, with later additions of Rove Dubai Marina, Rove Al Jafiliya and Rove At The Park, located next to Dubai Parks and Resorts’ theme park.
It also expects to open the Rove Satwa hotel with 480 rooms and a direct access to the Dubai International Convention Centre and Dubai International Financial Centre. The twin-tower development will include serviced residences. Rove Hotels plans to operate 10 properties with more than 2,660 rooms.
The company also plans to take the Vida brand to Jeddah and Bahrain.
Internationally, it will add 707 hotel rooms and 833 serviced residences.
The Dubai-listed company has teamed up with Eagle Hills, the Abu Dhabi-based private real estate investment and development company, to operate The Address Fujairah Resort and Spa. The 196-room property will also feature 177 apartments and 10 villas.
Under its Address brand, it will add The Address Boulevard Dubai with 196 rooms, The Address Sky View Dubai with 169 rooms, and The Address Fountain Views Dubai with 193 rooms, all in Downtown Dubai.
The new openings will take the total number of new hotel rooms being added by Emaar Hospitality Group in the UAE to 3,835 and the number of new serviced residences to 4,249, it said.
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