Pickalbatros Hotels will open three new hotels in Hurghada and Marsa Alam by next February, Al Mal quotes Pickalbatros Group Chairman Kamel Abou Ali as saying. Although Abou Ali did not disclose the total investment value for the projects, he did say that the cost per room is USD 80-120k. By our math, that suggests the group is spending somewhere between USD 229-344 mn on the hotels.

In detail: The hotels include a 318-room property, which the company is reportedly expecting to become operational in the next few days, and a 1,500-room hotel and entertainment facility that will open its doors next month, both of which are in Hurghada. The third 1k-room hotel in Marsa Alam will be up and running in February 2023, according to Abou Ali. The company is separately mulling another four or five hotels, he said, without disclosing further details.

Where the money’s coming from: The first Hurghada hotel is partially self-financed, with the remainder of the cost coming from a portion of a EGP 800 mn loan the company secured last year from the National Bank of Egypt and Banque Misr, two sources with knowledge of the matter told Enterprise. The sources declined to disclose details on the funding for the remaining two hotels.

Separately: The remainder of the EGP 800 mn loan, along with a USD 23 mn loan the company secured from South African fund manager Vantage Capital last year, went towards working capital and to finance the acquisition and renovation of hotels from Balbaa Group in Sharm El Sheikh and Marsa Alam, our sources told us. Pickalbatros had separately been looking to secure a USD 40 mn convertible loan from Vantage Capital, but these talks have since fallen through, our sources confirmed.

About Pickalbatros: The Egypt-based regional hospitality company owns a total of 26 hotels with 14k rooms in Egypt and three properties with 1k rooms in Morocco.