The newest fund established by ActivumSG Capital Management, which focuses on turnaround and special opportunity investments in real estate, has acquired hotel operator Odyssey Hotel Group for an undisclosed amount in its second corporate acquisition following the purchase of Dutch residential developer VanWonen.
The fund - ActivumSG Real Estate Fund VI – is betting on the hotel industry’s recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic in select markets as the Covid-19 pandemic recedes.
‘We’re looking to accelerate the company’s growth through acquisitions and more hotel openings when others will still be picking up the pieces,’ said Saul Goldstein, CEO and Founder of ActivumSG. ‘We see the steady recovery of leisure and business travel in Europe’s most resilient hotel markets as a major opportunity for our latest fund. This corporate deal highlights how we look at every angle, so our investors get the best risk-adjusted exposure to strong investment themes.’
The deal follows the purchase of the luxury Nobu Hotel in Barcelona on 31st December.
Founded in 2013 and headquartered in Breda, the Netherlands, Odyssey focuses on opening and operating hotels in underserved mid-sized towns and cities in continental Europe. It currently operates 12 hotels in Germany, the Netherlands and Finland mostly under franchise agreements with Marriott Group and IHG.
The company already has a pipeline of 20 more hotels scheduled to open before the end of 2024, which will lift the number of guest rooms it operates to more than 5,200 from 1,940 today. These include two hotel openings planned for Austria and one in Spain.
Odyssey CEO Rick van Erp said: ‘The Activum fund’s support will allow us to scale up our platform and penetrate new markets in Europe, broadening the footprint of our major hotel brand partners. We are looking ahead with confidence at a post-Covid landscape for the hospitality sector, which will present opportunities for those operators with the liquidity, agility and industry expertise to benefit most from the recovery.’
Advising ActivumSG Real Estate Fund VI on the transaction were JLL and Greenberg & Traurig, while Adelaer Group and Stibbe were advisers to Odyssey.
