HNA acquires US-based Radisson hotels

Updated: 2016-04-29 11:26

By Ai Heping in New York(China Daily USA)

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HNA acquires US-based Radisson hotels

Country Inn & Suites in Springfi eld, Illinois. Provided To China Daily

In the latest Chinese investment in overseas hotel properties and in an apparent attempt to tap into China's growing global tourism market, HNA Group is acquiring the Minnesota-based Carlson Hotel Group, one of the largest in the world.

Carlson Hotels has 1,400 properties under operation and development in 115 countries and territories. It operates seven brands of hotels across the Americas, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia and the Pacific, ranging from middle market to upper mid-scale and luxury. But its biggest business is Carlson Wagonlit Travel, which generated revenue of $24.2 billion in 2015, compared with $7.3 billion from the hotels. Carlson said will retain Wagonlit Travel.

Company officials declined to provide terms of the deal that was announced on Wednesday, but Bloomberg News, citing unnamed sources, reported it could be worth $2 billion.

The family-owned Carlson Hotel Group said HNA's tourism and hospitality arm, HNA Tourism Group, is also acquiring its 51.3 percent majority stake in the Rezidor Hotel Group AB, Carlson's Brussels-based master licensee for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and may begin a takeover offer for all of Rezidor, the companies said.

Carlson, founded by Curt Nelson in 1938, said it chose HNA Tourism over other suitors because the breadth of HNA's operations and its Asia ties made it the best fit.

"They have a significant presence in China. As hundreds of millions of Chinese tourists come to the Americas and Europe, we think there's an opportunity that they can help in securing reservations for those folks, arranging flights on their airline, providing tours and staying in the Carlson-branded hotels," Carlson Hospitality Group CEO David Berg said in an interview with the Star-Tribune of Minneapolis.

Berg will remain as chief of the company, which will keep its headquarters in the Minneapolis suburb of Minnetonka.

HNA Hospitality Group chairman and CEO Bai Haibo said in a statement the acquisition aimed to "establish our presence in the US market and expand our footprint in hospitality internationally".

In 2015, HNA acquired a 15 percent stake in the Red Lion Hotels Corp, an owner of mid-scale and full-service US hotels, for an undisclosed sum. It is the biggest shareholder in Spanish hotel company NH Hotel Group SA. In 2012, HNA purchased the 165-room Cassa Hotel in midtown Manhattan from Assa Properties for $130 million.

Chinese tourists spent $215 billion outside of the Chinese mainland in 2015, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council, 53 percent increase over the $140 billion in 2014. The number of Chinese tourists traveling internationally has more than doubled to 120 million people over the last five years, according to data from the China National Tourist Office and the tourism council.

The HNA-Carlson deal comes weeks after Anbang Insurance Group Co bid $14 billion for US-based Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc, but it walked away from the deal, enabling Marriott International Inc to go ahead with a takeover. Anbang bought the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York City for $2 billon in 2014.

HNA Group is a Fortune Global 500 company. It reported $29.3 billion in revenue in 2015 and employed almost 180,000 people, according to its website

HNA owns Hainan Airlines Co, China's fourth-largest publicly listed airline by fleet size. It has agreed to buy a stake in a Brazilian airline, Azul Linhas Aereas Brasileiras SA.

In February, HNA also was a bidder for London City Airport, but lost to a group led by Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Board. In that same month, HNA bought airport luggage handler Swissport International Ltd for $2.81 billion. In mid-April, HNA agreed to an all-cash deal to buy Gategroup Holding AG for $1.5 billion.

aiheping@chinadailyusa.com

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