EasyHotel
EasyHotel (styled easyHotel) is an international super budget hotel chain head quartered in London and listed on the Alternative Investment Market of the London Stock Exchange.
 | |
| Public limited company | |
| Traded as | LSE: EZH |
| Industry | Hotels |
| Founded | January 19, 2004 |
| Founder | Stelios Haji-Ioannou |
| Headquarters | London |
Number of locations | 40 |
Area served | Europe, Middle East |
Key people | Guy Parsons (Chief Executive) Gary Burton (Chief Financial Officer) |
| Services | Super budget hotel rooms |
| Website | easyhotel |
easyHotel owns, develops, operates and franchises hotels under the “super budget” easyHotel brand, marketing its hotels as offering clean, comfortable and safe hotel accommodation to its customers. The company was incorporated in 2004 and opened its first hotel in 2005.
easyHotel has 40 hotels worldwide. Locations include, UK, Switzerland, Germany, France, Spain, Belgium, Hungary, Portugal, Bulgaria and UAE.
History
Originally founded by Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou through easyGroup Holdings Ltd, easyHotel was incorporated in 2004 and opened its first hotel in South Kensington, London in 2005. Whilst easyHotel owned its first hotel in South Kensington (which was subsequently sold and franchised in 2007), its growth strategy in its early years was to expand via franchise contracts.
In 2007, Easygroup signed with Dubai-state-owned Istithmar Hotels for Istithmar to invest US$400mn in five years to build 38/3800 Easy hotels/rooms in Africa, Middle East and parts of Asia. Dubai opened in 2010; nothing since. <Travel Business Analyst, November 2019>
Later in 2007, Easyhotel signed a master franchise agreement with Germany-based Igen Hotels, planning 60 franchised EHs in Europe (outside the UK) in three years, of which about 10 were expected in Germany. <Travel Business Analyst, November 2019>
2007 saw the first three international franchise hotels open in Basel, Budapest and Zurich along with two further hotels in London, at Earl’s Court and Victoria.
2008 marked easyHotel’s expansion with the opening of hotels near Luton and Heathrow airports as well as in London Paddington.
Between 2010 and 2014, the Company continued to expand its portfolio through franchise partnerships with new openings in Scotland, Germany and The Netherlands. The group also acquired two London based hotels in Old Street (2012) and Croydon (2014).
In June 2014, the Company floated on the London Stock Exchange raising £24.5m to fund further growth and expansion.
In August 2019 directors of the company backed a £139 million bid for the company in August despite opposition from founder Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou.
The bidding consortium is made up of Luxembourg-based ICAMAP and Ivanhoé Cambridge of Canada. Ivanhoe is owned by Quebec’s pension company, CDPQ (Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec). <Travel Business Analyst, November 2019>
Operations
As of October 2019, easyHotel has:
- Thirteen corporately-owned hotels currently comprising 1,300 rooms in Old Street (London), Glasgow, Croydon, Birmingham, Manchester, Milton Keynes, Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield, Leeds, Ipswich, Barcelona (Spain) and Nice (France).
- Twenty seven franchised hotels with 2,136 rooms in Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Portugal, Switzerland, UAE, and the United Kingdom.
