Atlas in the news

Sacramento Business Journal 11/23/15 Construction Timeline for Sacramento Kings Hotel Tower Is Slipping By Ben van der Meer http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/blog/morning-roundup/2015/11/is-slipping.html   The cranes are in place, site work is underway and some tenants have been announced for the 16-story mixed-use tower opposite Golden 1 Center. Described as a complement to the arena, the tower is a focal point for the retail/entertainment area the Sacramento Kings call Downtown Commons. Plans call for the tower to accommodate 250 hotel rooms, 45,000 square feet of retail space, some office space and about 50 top-floor luxury condominiums. But less than a year before the team’s arena opens, contractors haven’t yet pulled permits for vertical construction. Given the usual timelines for such a building, that suggests the tower will still be under construction when the arena opens next fall. That casts serious doubt on team suggestions that the building would be partially open by the first game in October 2016. The team also may not make its goal of having the tower hotel, carrying the Kimpton brand, open in time to host NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament games in March 2017. Team officials, without elaboration, would only say the project is still on track to…

Silicon Valley Business Journal 11/18/15 Exclusive First Look: Why Sunnyvale’s Sleek New Millennium Hotel Is Being Built in Poland By Nathan Donato-Weinstein http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2015/11/18/exclusive-first-look-why-sunnyvales-sleek-new.html   Sometime in the next two years or so, craftsmen in Poland will put the finishing touches on 263 individual hotel rooms, then stack them on a single container ship bound for the Port of Oakland. From there, they’ll be trucked to a vacant lot in Sunnyvale, where they will be unloaded one by one and assembled on-site into Northern California’s first Millennium Hotel. It will go up in about 12 weeks. A similar prefab strategy will result in a 250-unit residential complex next door, but instead of a sea voyage, the apartments will take a six-day train trip from a factory in Idaho. “We are not only challenging ourselves to build a new, different kind of hotel,” said Aloysius Lee, group chief executive officer for Millennium Hotels and Resorts, the London-based company behind the project. “We are also challenging ourselves in using new technology, a new methodology of building.” The estimated $200 million development represents what could be the most ambitious modular construction effort yet undertaken in Silicon Valley. While prefabricated units have been used in…

MediaPost.com 11/17/15 Marriott Books Starwood’s Rooms and Marketing Finesse By Thom Forbes http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/262773/marriott-books-starwoods-rooms-and-marketing-fine.html   Marriott International’s surprise $12.2 billion deal for Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide yesterday puts together 30 brands and 1.1 million rooms in more than 100 countries together to form the world’s largest hotelier. The combination hopes to forestall upstarts such as Airbnb that operate on a different business model and were just a blip on the competitive landscape only a few years ago. “The driving force behind this transaction is growth. This is an opportunity to create value by combining the distribution and strengths of Marriott and Starwood, enhancing our competitiveness in a quickly evolving marketplace,” says Marriott president and CEO Arne Sorenson in a statement announcing the deal. “This greater scale should offer a wider choice of brands to consumers, improve economics to owners and franchisees, increase unit growth and enhance long-term value to shareholders.” Sorenson tells Fortune’s Leigh Gallagher that beyond size, the companies are complementary in their strengths: “I think in the DNA of Marriott is being an operating company, and in many respects Starwood is a brand and marketing company, and if we can keep the best of both of those, we…

The Orange County Register 10/30/15 Hyatt Regency in Garden Grove Sold to Chinese Buyer for $137 Million By Jonathan Lansner http://www.ocregister.com/articles/hotel-689967-hotels-room.html The rush for hotels rolls on: A Chinese construction company has just bought the Hyatt Regency Orange County in Garden Grove for $137 million. SCG America, the U.S. arm of the giant Shanghai Construction Group, acquired the 656-room hotel, built in 1986. The seller, the Xenia Hotels & Resorts real estate trust, paid $112 million for the hotel in 2008, near the previous real estate peak. The Chinese company is interested in the cash flow from the hotel’s operations as well as development potential on the 9.4- acre site, said Harry Pflueger, a principal with Maxim Hotel Brokerage, which helped SCG with the deal. Hyatt Regency, just down the street from Disneyland and the Anaheim Convention Center, should benefit from expansion plans for both places, Pflueger said. The hotel has been 77 percent full this year with an average room rate of $154 a night. “The market’s very hot,” said Pflueger, referring to the pace of California hotel deals. “Nobody has a perfect crystal ball, but there’s a pretty good three-year landing strip to this cycle.” This sale is…

The San Diego Union-Tribune 11/16/15 InterContinental Returning to San Diego By Lori Weisberg San Diego will see the return of long absent InterContinental Hotels & Resorts, with the development of a new 400-room hotel on the waterfront in downtown San Diego. The 19-story, $218.7 million hotel had been long planned, but it was only recently that the development team finalized plans with InterContinental to operate the luxury property. To read the rest of the article, please visit: http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/nov/16/intercontinental-hotel-coming-san-diego-waterfront/

Los Angeles Times 11/16/15 Marriott’s Plan to Buy Starwood for $12.2 Billion Could Trigger More Hotel Mergers By Hugo Martin http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-marriott-starwood-20151116-story.html   Marriott International Inc.’s plan to acquire Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. will create the world’s largest hotel company and could trigger more mergers as rivals jockey to compete. The deal announced Monday to unite Marriott and Starwood, valued at about $12.2 billion, would create a hotel company with 5,500 hotels and more than 1.1 million rooms in more than 100 countries. The new behemoth would own 30 hotel brands including the Ritz-Carlton, JW Marriott, Courtyard, St. Regis, W, Sheraton and Westin. In the hotel world, “it’s the biggest transaction of our lifetime,” said Bjorn Hanson, a professor at New York University’s Tisch Center for Hospitality and Tourism. Bethesda, Md.-based Marriott has about 4,300 hotel properties in its portfolio, most of which are operated as franchises owned by private investors. Stamford, Conn.-based Starwood has about 1,200 hotels, with about half operated as franchises. In California, Marriott has 312 hotels and Starwood has 71. Marriott’s size and breadth after the acquisition could prompt other hotel companies, such as Intercontinental Hotel Group and Hilton Worldwide, to consider joining forces with…

The Orange County Register 10/22/15 Hospitality Veteran and Former Irvine Co. Executive Launches Karas, a Lifestyles Hotel Brand By Hannah Madans http://www.ocregister.com/lansner/hotels-688604-prevette-president.html   A hospitality veteran formerly with The Irvine Co. has joined forces with Carlos Lopes, Murray Holland and an investment banking firm in Dallas to launch Karas Lifestyle Hotels. Eric Prevette, Lopes and Holland will serve as managing directors of the Newport Beach-based company, which will manage and develop lifestyle hotels. Karas does not have any confirmed properties in its portfolio but plans to have two by year’s end, the company told the Register. Prevette and Lopes previously owned and operated Unique Hotels & Resorts, also in Newport Beach. “Lifestyle brands are dominating the industry and reflect the highest future growth potential of any hotel market segment. We have the experience, resources and proven track record to quickly establish the Karas brand as a market leader in this segment,” Prevette said in a statement. Investors are paying record amounts for California hotels, with spending this year on pace to exceed any previous year. Atlas Hospitality Group of Irvine in August reported a record $4.4 billion was spent for 174 California hotels in the first half of the year….

Los Angeles Times 10/17/15 Dark Harbor Halloween Event May Finally Scare Up Success for Queen Mary By Hugo Martin http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-queen-mary-halloween-20151017-story.html   In the 48 years that the Queen Mary has been docked in Long Beach Harbor, a series of operators tried to turn the aging ocean liner into a thriving hotel and tourist attraction, with a mixed record of success. But the tide finally may be turning for the 1,000-foot-long ship, thanks partly to the surging attendance of several special events hosted by the Queen Mary, including its annual Halloween festivity, dubbed Dark Harbor. The event, which has grown along with Halloween’s increasing popularity with adults, could draw more than 120,000 people this season, helping keep the ship afloat after perennial losses. “It’s a profitable enterprise now, which it hasn’t been for a number of years,” said Michael Conway, the city’s business and property development director. Revenue from the events, including a September music festival, has jumped 400% over the last five years. And as the events have exposed more people to the Queen Mary, revenue from rentals of the ship’s 314 rooms has increased by 85% in the same period, according to city financial records. Those results are promising…

Laguna Beach Independent 09/26/15 Hotels Check-in to Water Saving By Tim J. Randall https://www.lagunabeachindy.com/hotels-check-in-to-water-saving/   Even before drought struck California, hotel guests routinely entered rooms outfitted with eco-conscious messages, encouraging travelers to reuse towels and forego a daily change of bedding. That turned out to be the easy first step. Now, in addition to asking guests to curb their water usage, hotel operators are coming up with even more ingenious solutions to tighten up their water use, according to Andy Brunhart, general manager of the South Coast Water District, which serves South Laguna and nearby cities. He’s pleased because tangible results by hotels helped the district surpass its 24 percent water reduction target by achieving a 33 percent drop in use in July as compared to July of 2013 figures. And hotel operators are equally pleased by the cost savings. At Montage Laguna Beach, a new procedure at the resort’s three restaurants saves 3,000 gallons of water a week, said managing director Rick Reiss. “We have taken the drought incredibly serious. We began to research possibilities to go above and beyond the state of California mandates,” he said. An article written by the executive chef at the Post Ranch Inn…

Orange County Business Journal 09/21/15 Marketing Arm Grows with Hotel Trade in Irvine HOSPITALITY: Boost in store for improvement-district coffers By Paul Hughes http://www.ocbj.com/news/2015/sep/21/marketing-arm-grows-hotel-trade-irvine/ Irvine’s growing role as a hospitality hub will bring its own reward to hotels in the city. The benefit is expected to come in the form of an additional $750,000 for cooperative marketing efforts on behalf of the growing roster of hotels throughout the city over the next two to three years. The nearly 36% increase from the $2.1 million expected to flow to a city-sanctioned hotel improvement district in the current fiscal year would come from six new establishments—one that opened in August and five more in various stages of planning. The growth streak is set to raise the number of hotels in Irvine to 21 over the next 18 months. That places Irvine in the middle of the pack of OC cities for hotel counts and takes the total room count in the city up to about 4,700—both gains of more than 30% (see sidebar, below). A bed tax of 8% is expected to bring the city itself $11.2 million this fiscal year, a city spokesperson said. The hotel improvement district in Irvine (see…

Orange County Business Journal 09/22/15 Pacifica in $44M Hotel Sale By Paul Hughes http://www.ocbj.com/news/2015/sep/22/pacifica-44m-hotel-sale/ Irvine-based Pacifica Hotels sold the Hilton Garden Inn Marina del Rey to Chatham Lodging Trust in West Palm Beach, Fla., for $44.5 million. The price works out to about $332,000 per room for the 134-room property. About half the purchase price—$22.6 million—came through the assumption of debt on the property, Chatham said. Pacifica bought the hotel, then called the Marina International Hotel, for about $20.2 million in May 2006. It renovated the property and relaunched it under the Hilton name in June 2013. It owns four other hotels in the Marina del Rey area—Marina del Rey Hotel, Jamaica Bay Inn, Inn at Marina del Rey and Inn at Venice Beach—each of which it has renovated. “We will continue to strategically develop and reposition assets in premier destinations,” said Pacifica Hotels Chief Executive Matt Marquis in a statement. “This sale is another example of the premium prices being achieved for well located, top branded hotels in the marketplace today,” said Alan Reay, president of Atlas Hospitality Group in Irvine. Pacifica is owned by Invest West Financial Corp. in Santa Barbara. It owns and operates some 30 properties…

Silicon Valley Business Journal 09/09/15 Meet the Downtown San Jose Hotel Being Built Without Many People Knowing About It By Nathan Donato-Weinstein http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2015/09/09/meet-the-downtown-san-jose-hotel-being-built.html If you live or work in downtown San Jose, you may have walked by a new hotel under construction and not even realized it. For the last several months — and somewhat under the radar — construction crews have been swarming 100 E. Santa Clara St. to convert the 27,000-square-foot office building to a 44-room hotel. Folks, meet “Hotel Clariana” (the name is for the street), which an owner’s representative described to me last week as an “upscale” boutique hotel. “Everything’s going to be updated,” said Tina Phan, of ownership group RSTP Investments LLC. “It’s not like other hotels. We want to have a really nice place for business people and families.” RSTP acquired the five-story building back in 2009 through a deed in lieu of foreclosure after the previous owner defaulted on a $4.8 million loan. In 2009, RSTP leased the building to the now-defunct San Jose Redevelopment Agency, which established the Entrepreneur Center there, leasing it to nonprofits and business development groups. That lease expired a few years ago, and the owners had to decide…