SA hotel chain to open at Two Rivers next month

Published on Tuesday, 17 October 2017 12:14

South Africa’s hospitality group City Lodge is set to open its Two Rivers Mall hotel next month, adding to Nairobi’s bed space and raising competition in the sector.

The international hotel chain is putting finishing touches to the 172-room property.

It is the latest addition to the portfolio of the multinational which also runs Nairobi’s Fairview Hotel and Town Lodge after buying them from their previous owners.

The new hotel is betting on the Two Rivers shopping complex brand to attract guests.

Two Rivers is one of the largest mixed-use developments in the country which on completion will have offices, a hospital and residential houses in addition to the shopping mall, which opened its doors early this year.

City Lodge says the new property is part of its local and regional expansion plan.

“After several years of carefully targeting a selective southern African and eastern African expansion strategy, our group is on the threshold of adding significant scale to existing operations in South Africa, Botswana and Kenya,” the company said in its latest annual report.

“By the third quarter of 2018, our hotel footprint outside of South Africa will rise to seven, offering 929 rooms to travellers in five different countries — Botswana, Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia and Tanzania.”

Competition for guests, including business travellers, conference participants and holidaymakers, is set to rise as analysts forecast more supply of rooms to hit the market in the medium term.

A new report by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Hotel Outlook 2017, estimates that a total of 13 hotels are set to open their doors in Kenya over the next five years, growing the bed space by over 2,400 rooms.

Source: Business Daily Newspaper.

Choppies to open outlet in Embakasi

Published on Friday, 13 October 2017 12:31

Botswana retailer Choppies is set to open a new outlet in Embakasi by end of the year, bucking the trend that has seen several supermarkets announce branch closures in recent months.

Choppies, which entered the Kenyan market by taking over several Ukwala stores last year, will become the anchor tenant at Embakasi’s South Field Mall.

The mall, whose other tenants include Java, Nairobi Hospital, KFC and Bata, is scheduled for opening by the end of this year.

Choppies opened a new outlet at Kiambu Mall in August, taking up space that was previously allocated to market leader Nakumatt Supermarkets.

Vijay Kumar, Choppies East Africa’s executive director, told the Business Daily at the time that the retail chain plans to open five outlets at Diamond Plaza (Parklands), Signature Mall (Molo), Spur Mall (Ruiru) and another one in Diani (Mombasa) by the end of this year and three more by mid-2018.

“Our intention is to have hyper and express signature stores that stock local as well as offer international brands that are currently unavailable in the market,” Mr Kumar said then in an interview.

“Each of the new stores will cost us approximately Sh200 million to fit out and fully stock.

“We will also refurbish all the Ukwala stores to fit this new model and look.”

The Botswana-listed budget retailer has 10 stores in Kenya having taken over the latest Ukwala store in April this year.

The company had earlier said it is still operating below break-even in Kenya and its other new markets such as in Zambia and Mozambique.

Choppies has operations in seven African countries including South Africa and Zimbabwe with 217 stores.

Choppies chief executive Ramachandran Ottapathu was quoted saying early this week it plans to open 40 more stores in Africa by mid next year at a cost of about $29 million (Sh2.99 billion).

Source: Business Daily Newspaper.

Hilton to open Ngong Road outlet in Dec

Published on Tuesday, 10 October 2017 10:50

Global hotels brand Hilton is set to rebrand Nairobi’s Amber Hotel as part of a Sh5.2 billion ($50 million) plan to open about 100 hotels in Africa over the next five years.

Hilton, in a statement yesterday, said that renovations on the Ngong Road hotel are currently ongoing in time for opening at the end of the year.

The property will be renamed the DoubleTree by Hilton.

Amber Hotel’s owners will continue to own the facility under a franchising agreement. Amber’s facilities are currently being upgraded to align them with Hilton’s international standards.

“The model of converting existing hotels into Hilton branded properties has proved highly successful in a variety of markets and we expect to see great opportunities to convert hotels to Hilton brands through the initiative,” said Patrick Fitzgibbon, senior vice president for development in Africa.

In addition to the 109-room Amber Hotel, Hilton Worldwide is also converting the 153-room Ubumwe Grande Hotel in Kigali. The conversion is expected to be complete in 2018. This will be Hilton’s first hotel in Rwanda.

Hilton currently operates 19 hotels in sub-Saharn Africa.

In Kenya the company has plans to open a hotel in Upper Hill to be located at the planned Pinnacle Tower development, a building which is expected to be Africa’s tallest on completion.

Hilton Worldwide is also developing a 171-room hotel, dubbed Garden Inn, near the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA). The hotelier will operate the Sh2.3 billion facility under a management contract.

Hilton Garden Inn was initially supposed to open in March 2016.

In pushing the opening date back, the hotelier cited hitches in the construction.

Development in Kenya’s hospitality sector is booming with the country expected to get an additional 4,000 hotel beds in the next five years.

Advisory firm PwC estimates that 13 hotels will set up in Kenya over the next five years.

Kenya has seen multi-billion investments in the hospitality sector in the past five years, with the opening of such properties as Park Inn Radisson and the Lazizi hotel near the JKIA.

Source: Business Daily Newspaper.

GroFin gets Sh1bn US grant to fund agribusiness in East Africa

Published on Tuesday, 10 October 2017 10:46

GroFin, a firm that provides financing for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), has received a Sh1 billion ($10 million) grant from the United States government to support agribusinesses in East Africa.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAid) in a statement said the funds would benefit SMEs in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania.

With the money, GroFin will review 200 agribusinesses from which it will draw a smaller pool of enterprises for commercial investment in the form of debt and quasi-equity.

“Our intent is to provide business support and assistance to catalyse investments into food security, staple foods and high value nutrition products,” said Rishi Khubchandani, investment executive at GroFin.

Businesses will also be provided technical support including on creating and implementing effective business plans and incorporating sound environmental practices into their processes.

Companies targeted under the programme will have to demonstrate that they are contributing to food security, using technology in waste management on the agricultural value chain and increasing productivity through innovation.

The funds have been extended through the East Africa Trade and Investment Hub, a programme funded by USAid to support regional integration and competitiveness in the agricultural sector.

GroFin operates in Africa and the Middle East with a presence in at least 14 countries.

Source: Business Daily Newspaper.