The Avani Nairobi Suites, owned by the Thailand-based Avani Hotels and Resorts, is set to be opened in Kenya by the end of this year.
Being co-developed with Fedha Group, the real estate property will be located in the Westlands part of Nairobi where it will be able to tap into the clientele that comprises not just the Multinationals companies (MNC’s) located in the city but also the hospitality industries, such as restaurants.
The Avani Hotels and Resorts is also located in the Southern part of Africa, such as Zambia, Namibia, Lesotho and Botswana.
“ The expansion of Avani Hotels and Resorts into East Africa is the first of its kind, reflecting the growing demand of the brand as it as there are other properties located in the Southern part of Africa,” states the Vice President of Avani Hotels and Resorts, Mr Javier Pardo.
Upon completion, the Avani Nairobi Suites which has been designed by Beglin Woods Architects, will have 90 rooms having one bedrooms being 100 square rooms, 20 rooms with two bedrooms and ten rooms with three bedrooms, the latter of which have been serviced and featuring 200 square metres, as well as a gym and an in-door swimming pool.
According to Hotel Resource News, the foray of Avani Hotels and Resorts into East Africa is also a testament of the real estate partnerships that it wishes to pursue, such as the Kenyan-based Fedha Group and Minor Hotels, another Thai-based hotelier, which has a global presence in Europe, the Middle East and African (EMEA) continents, as well as in Asia.
“ We are thrilled to partner with Fedha Group for the construction of Avani Nairobi Suites, as it is an opportunity to not just launch the brand, but also offer our strong existing leisure offering across East Africa,” says the Vice President of Development EMEA Minor Hotels, Mr Ramine Beham.
Other than the Avani brand, Minor Hotels last year also signed on two hotel brands to its portfolio from Qatar, which are known as the Anantara and NH Collection.
“ Fedha Group is proud to add the Avani Nairobi Suites to its hospitality works, and also on partnering with Minor Hotels for the same. The location of the Nairobi Suites is also significant because it has a global status,” says Mr Dhruv Pandit, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Fedha Group.
One of the aspects that gives Nairobi its global status is that it is one of the four cities in the world to have the United Nations (UN) headquarters. The others cities that do share this accolade are Geneva in Switzerland, New York in the United States of America (U.S.A) and Vienna in Austria.
Avani Hotels and Resorts also joins other hoteliers seeking acquisitions, such as the acquisition of Pride Group of Hotels, which acquired the Nairobi-based Azure hotel earlier on this month.
For other hotels that are located in the city, such as the Southern Sun Mayfair Hotel, owned by Tsogo Sun, they have not had much luck as they have resorted to closing down.
This announcement comes at the same time after the American and United Kingdom (U.K) governments issued travel advisories to warn their citizens from coming to Kenya, following the January 5th attack of a Kenya Defense Force Military Base in Manda Bay island in the town of Lamu, which has the consequence of negatively affecting the tourism industry.
Going by precedent, a 2019 report published by Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC), known as the “2019-2023 Hospitality Outlook” indicated that while the number of tourists who came into the country grew by 2 million in 2019, in the previous year, they were 1.5 million.
But the report indicated that such growth could be affected by terrorism attacks, such as the Al Shabaab one undertaken on DustItD2 Hotel in January 2019, which not only resulted in the death of 21 people but consequently led to the issue of travel advisories by both the governments of the United States of America (U.S.A) and U.K.
