Unveiled last August, the discussions on the transfer of ownership of the hotel group founded in England in 2004 could come to an end with the arrival of a Dutch fund.
To support its ambitious European expansion plan, i.e. to grow from the current 49 hotels to several hundred by 2030, the hotel group, born of Stelios Haji-Ioannou’s diversification of the easyJet low-cost concept, could change hands.
EasyHotel is currently a network of 49 hotels in 11 countries, with around a third of its establishments located in the UK. This network includes 17 franchised hotels with 1,250 rooms, as well as 32 owned or leased hotels with over 3,500 rooms, including sites such as easyHotel Paris Nord Aubervilliers, easyHotel Euromed in Marseille and easyHotel Basel.
Since last year, the 79% shareholders ICAMAP and Ivanhoe Cambridge have entrusted the bank NM Rothschild & Sons with the exclusive search for a new partner. Several candidates have already been mentioned, including TPG, an investment company founded by Jim Coulter and David Bonderman, and the British property fund Proprium Capital Partners.
Dutch fund PGGM in the best position
According to our colleague CFNews Immo, Dutch pension fund PGGM is now the frontrunner. This fund has shown a keen interest in hotel property since joining forces with L+R Hotels in 2022 to launch LRO Hospitality, a hotel asset management company with a target of investing up to €1 billion in Europe.
The expected valuation of the group in the event of the sale of the majority shareholders’ shares would be around 400 million euros, compared with just 170 million dollars when they joined in 2019.
To support its expansion through acquisition and construction in the UK and Europe, easyHotel recently strengthened its financial position by obtaining a €51 million loan from Santander UK, as well as an additional €6 million loan from BRED Banque for one of its hotels in France.
