Tag: Harry Mohinani

Platinum Puts Hotel Asturias in Madrid Up for Sale

1 March 2019 – Eje Prime

The Hong Kong-based investment group Platinum is looking for a buyer for the Hotel Asturias in Madrid, which it purchased in 2014 and which is going to be home to the W chain’s first hotel in the Spanish capital.

Platinum acquired the hotel from the Salazar family five years ago for €35 million. That operation included the two buildings now for sale located at numbers 9 and 11 Carrera de San Jerónimo, close to Plaza del Sol.

In addition, Platinum is looking to divest another property from its portfolio: the building that it owns on Calle de Jacometrezo. That property contains 139 rooms, is going to be operated by Marriott’s Aloft chain and is due to open in April.

Platinum is managed by the Indian textile merchant Harry Mohinani and his wife Roshni Mohinani; it entered the Spanish market in conjunction with Juan Luis Segalerva.

Original story: Eje Prime (by I. P. Gestal)

Summary translation by: Carmel Drake

Indian Fund Platinum Estates Creates €300M Fund to Buy Hotel Assets

28 May 2018 – Eje Prime

Platinum Estates is investing and divesting in Spain. The fund led by the Indian investor Harry Mohinani has launched a new vehicle, its third in Spain, to acquire hotel assets. The entity is going to have a purchasing capacity of €300 million.

In order to set up this new vehicle, Platinum Estates has been engaged in a period of divestment, according to El Confidencial. In recent months, Platinum Estates has agreed the sale of four Hilton establishments (Garden Inn Luton, Manchester Airport, Warwick and St. Anne’s Manor).

Moreover, the fund also sold a luxury residential development that it was promoting on c/General Oraá (Madrid) and Edificio Estel (Barcelona, pictured above), the building made famous for housing the headquarters of Telefónica and which it purchased at the height of the economic crisis.

The latter was the subject of the star operation in the divestment strategy of Mohinani’s fund, given that Platinum paid around €56 million for the property, four years ago, and has sold it for almost €150 million.

Original story: Eje Prime

Translation: Carmel Drake

Marbella Rises From The Ashes With A €300M W Hotel Resort

27 March 2017 – El Economista

The investor group Platinum Estates, owned by the magnate Harry Mohinani, and the Marriott International group, have signed an agreement to launch the Hotel W Marbella Resort, which will be constructed in the Malagan town of the same name and which will cost around €300 million.

The agreement first started to take shape in September 2015, when the group owned by Mohinani expressed its interest in investing in the town to make one of Marbella’s dreams a reality: to be born again as a luxury destination. In this sense, the mayor José Bernal said that the future complex represents the “resurgence” of luxury international hotel brands in Marbella, after more than 50 years. “It improves the quality of supply in the town”, he added.

Specifically, the W chain has just one establishment in Spain. The W Barcelona (pictured above), also known as the sail hotel, is a 99 m building that was designed by the Spanish architect Ricardo Bofill.

The hotel in Marbella will have 600 beds, will create around 1,000 direct jobs and will target customers with significant spending power. The ground floor, which will be four storeys high, will occupy a surface area of 50,000 m2, and will extend for 60 m along the coast. There will also be 54,000 m2 of green space, 27,000 m2 assigned to services and access roads and 19,000 m2 for facilities. One of the venue’s attractions will be a sand dune, which will be integrated into the hotel complex.

In total, the plot of land on which the property will be built will have a surface area of 160,000 m2, located in a really beautiful area.

Original story: El Economista

Translation: Carmel Drake

Starwood Will Open ‘W Madrid’ In 2018

20 January 2016 – Cinco Días

Starwood’s W brand will soon arrive in Madrid. Yesterday, the hotel chain announced that it will open the doors of a new hotel in the capital in 2018, in a property that is across the road from the Four Seasons hotel, which will itself open in the Canalejas complex currently being developed by Villar Mir. The arrival of the W brand represents another boost for the city’s luxury hotel market…and for Spain, which will thus become the only country in Europe to have two hotels operating under the brand.

“The opening of a second W hotel in Spain demonstrates the significant demand for this innovative lifestyle brand in such an important tourist market”, said Michael Wale, President of Starwood Hotels & Resorts for Europe, Africa and the Middle East, in a statement.

The future hotel will be located in the former Hotel Asturias, at numbers 9 and 11 on Carrera de San Jerónimo, which used to be operated by the company Hispano Hotelera, until September 2014. The two buildings that comprised the hotel, which used to be owned by the Salazar family, the former owners of SOS, were then sold to Platinum Estates, the investor vehicle of the Indian textile businessman Harry Mohinani, for more than €30 million. However, the properties currently belong to Merryland Inversiones, a company created in June 2014, which last year completed a €3.45 million capital increase and which is controlled, in turn, by Multiway Investment Limited Hong Kong.

“We think that the W brand fits perfectly with this historic property and we look forward to the emergence of W Madrid as one of the most sought-after and admired hotels in Spain”, said Harry Mohinani, the CEO of Merryland Inversiones.

Initially, the idea was to convert these buildings into luxury apartments, but in the end, the owners opted for a luxury hotel. The Starwood chain has been chosen to take over the new facility and it will represent the W brand’s first foray into the capital, since to date in Spain, its only presence is in Barcelona.

The new hotel will have 141 rooms, of which 21 will be suites. The future W Madrid, which will join the portfolio of 46 hotels that are already in operation around the world, will also have a rooftop terrace and two meeting rooms. The refurbishment of the property will be coordinated by the company Hospitality Solutions, which is headquartered in Hong Kong; the architectural firm Rockwell Group will also be involved – it has offices in Madrid and participated in the renovation of some parts of the Westin Palace, the only hotel that Starwood currently operates in the city. (…).

Original story: Cinco Días (by Laura Salces Acebes)

Translation: Carmel Drake