Minor Hotel Group opens office in Southern Africa

According to their media release, the opening of this new office is a strategic move for MHG, both combining resources to benefit the properties within the region and enabling the group to strengthen its position to maximise the opportunities within this key market.

At the beginning of July, five hotels in southern Africa were rebranded to MHG's upscale AVANI brand. The five properties form part of the portfolio in which MHG invested a total of R679.5 million in their strategic partnership with Sun International, announced in August last year. MHG's investment resulted in the group owning a stake in two properties in both Zambia and Lesotho and one property in Botswana and Namibia.

The 212-key Zambezi Sun in Zambia has been rebranded to AVANI Victoria Falls Resort; the 196-key Gaborone Sun in Botswana has become AVANI Gaborone Resort & Casino; the 158-key Lesotho Sun and 105-key Maseru Sun, both in Lesotho, have been rebranded to AVANI Lesotho Hotel & Casino and AVANI Maseru Hotel respectively, and the 173-key Kalahari Sands in Namibia has reflagged to AVANI Windhoek Hotel & Casino. The sixth property in the portfolio, the well known Royal Livingstone Resort, will not be rebranded and is being marketed through Anantara's distribution channels.
Since the partnership was formed last year, both companies' core strengths have been leveraged, with MHG assuming the hotel management, marketing and distribution of the properties, while Sun International has continued to manage the on-property casino operations.

Earlier this year MHG added six camps in Kenya, the result of two of East Africa's most prestigious property portfolios merging, following the acquisition of Cheli & Peacock Group of Companies by the Elewana Collection. The acquisition sees the six Cheli & Peacock properties, namely, Elsa's Kopje, Elephant Pepper Camp, Joy's Camp, Tortilis Camp, Kitich Camp and Lewa Safari Camp, merge under the banner of the Elewana Collection to form a comprehensive circuit of 14 properties spanning the highlights of Northern Tanzania, Kenya and Zanzibar.

In April MHG announced its first foray into North Africa through a new partnership with Qatari Diar Real Estate Investment Company to develop two new Anantara resorts to open in 2017 - the 93-key Anantara Tozeur Resort in the southwest of Tunisia and the 230-key Anantara Al Houara Tangier Resort in northern Morocco.