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Briefs: Hyatt, SVC negotiate | Brewdog in Edinburgh

Hyatt & SVC continue negotiations: The Newton, Massachusetts-based REIT Service Properties Trust (SVC) has operated hundreds of hotels under IHG, Marriott, Wyndham, Radisson, and Hyatt brands, and now the company appears to be in the process of converting most of them to Sonesta, of which SVC owns 34%. Hyatt informed SVC back in January that it intends to hand over the keys of 22 Hyatt Place hotels back to SVC after exhausting the US$50 million minimum guaranty. Hyatt and SVC have agreed to postpone the exit from April 8 to May 22, 2021, while negotiations continue.

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NYC’s Hotel Pennsylvania to be razed: The New York-based REIT Vornado Realty Trust plans to create a tracking stock centered on its development projects around Manhattan’s Pennsylvania Station, which will include a new tower the company intends to build in place of the Hotel Pennsylvania. Vornado will “permanently close and raze the hotel,” Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Steven Roth said in his annual letter to shareholders Friday. “This decision was inevitable. The Pennsylvania may have been a grande dame in its time, but it is decades past its glory and sell-by date.” The news comes a year after Vornado shut down the hotel in response to the pandemic.

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Mövenpick Melbourne on Spencer: Accor, together with Singapore’s Fragrance Group Limited, will open Australia’s second Mövenpick with the opening of Mövenpick Hotel Melbourne on Spencer in May 2021. The 172-room hotel will form the six-level podium of the 78-story Elenberg Fraser architect-designed Premier Tower development. The hotel is the second Mövenpick hotel for the Accor/Fragrance partnership in Australia, following the opening of Mövenpick Hotel Hobart, which opened in January this year.

Verkehrsbüro sells in Austria: Austrian travel group the Verkehrsbüro Group has sold the 125-room Sporthotel Fontana in the Austrian ski resort of Fieberbrunn to German developer and hotel operator Auszeit Hotel & Resort AG. The hotel includes an indoor pool and a spa and wellness area, as well as three F&B outlets.

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Bespoke managing sold Dumbleton Hall: Bespoke Hotels, the UK’s largest independent hotel group, has been appointed to manage the UK’s Cotswold country hotel Dumbleton Hall following its recent sale. With a history dating back over 400 years, Dumbleton Hall is a classic Grade II listed country house hotel with 38 individually-designed bedrooms. The appointment comes following the sale of the hotel to a U.S.-based buyer.

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Brewdog in Edinburgh: Brewdog, the Scottish brewer and pub chain, has announced plans for a beer-themed hotel in Edinburgh. The Doghouse-branded boutique hotel will be in a former school. Co-founder James Watt says to “expect beer on tap in all the rooms, mini-bars filled with the best beers in the planet and fridges in the shower for shower beers.” The hotel is expected to open later this year.

More from the BBC

Singapore to pump US$51M into tourism: Minister for Trade and Industry Chan Chun Sing announced that Singapore will be topping up SGD68.5 million (US$51 million) into its Tourism Development Fund to support tourism enterprises amidst the pandemic, according to reporting from HVS. To ensure sustainable tourism growth, Chan called on the industry to tap on technology and innovation such as promoting the use of mobile applications, virtual or augmented reality and remote interactions. These concepts have been tested out recently, with the Changi Airport Group launching the Safe Travel Concierge, a one-stop portal for passengers flying to Singapore to book their on-arrival COVID-19 polymerase chain reaction test and access pre-travel documents to enter the country.

TUI launches convertible bonds offering: The management board of Hanover, Germany-based travel and tourism company TUI AG will launch an offering of senior unsecured bonds convertible as per their terms and conditions due 2028 in an aggregate principal amount of approximately €350 million (US$416 million), with the option to increase the issuance volume to €400 million (US$476 million). TUI intends to use the proceeds from the offering to further improve its liquidity position as the COVID-19 crisis continues and subsequently for the repayment of existing financing instruments.

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Site hosting Hong Kong giveaway crashes: The website hosting the Hong Kong Tourism Board’s giveaway of HK$10 million (US$1.28 million) worth of hotel discounts crashed on Friday under intense demand from the public. The website “Staycation Delights – Holiday At Home,” which is offering discounts worth HK$500 (US$64) for 20,000 hotel bookings, was offline for half the day as eager users tried to access the page at 10 a.m. on Friday. More than half of the hotels participating were booked out by the evening.

More from the South China Morning Post

German hoteliers suing Booking.com: The German Hotel Association supports a class-action lawsuit brought by around 2,000 hotels against Booking.com at the Berlin Regional Court. The suit claims that, since 2004 at the latest, the booking portal has applied best-price clauses with which it prohibited affiliated hotels from offering rooms at lower rates through any other distribution channel. With these clauses, the suit says Booking.com shielded its business model against any competition in violation of antitrust law, which ultimately allowed the company to collect booking commissions of up to 50% of the room rate from hoteliers.

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Expedia settles false advertising class actions: Travel booking giant Expedia and its affiliates will take steps to ensure non-partnering hotels are no longer falsely advertised as “sold out” on its platforms under the terms of a class action settlement approved Friday. A U.S. district judge approved the deal nearly five years after two California hotels sued the online booking company in August 2016. Buckeye Tree Lodge and Sequoia Village Inn claim Expedia used deceptive online ads to target consumers who searched for hotels that could not be booked through Expedia. In February, both sides proposed a settlement in which Expedia will commit to a series of measures to ensure nonparticipating hotels are no longer listed on its platforms.

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Airbnb’s 8-step safety plan: As individuals begin to make plans to travel again, Airbnb has launched its “Summer of Responsible Travel,” an 8-point plan aimed at helping hosts and guests to up their safety standards. Key components of the 8-step plan include new restrictive rules to ban parties and help prevent events that may disturb neighbors and an over 50% increase in “community support” staff who will be on call to help travelers.

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