Building Dubai’s hospitality industry beyond 2020: Voivenel

The Hospitality Expansion Middle East summit witnessed keen discussions on building Dubai’s hospitality industry beyond 2020. One of the speakers Laurent A Voivenel, CEO of HMH – Hospitality Management Holdings shared his views on the topic.

Voivenel stressed on the need for the country to focus on more mid-market hotels. “If Dubai is to draw 20 million visitors annually by 2020 it will need to diversify its hospitality offering. There is an urgency to accelerate development of mid-market hotels in order to reach the right mix of accommodation available in the market. Investors must broaden their horizon and consider budget hotels as the hotel market gets stronger. It is undoubtedly a fast growing and highly competitive segment that will reap rich dividends.”

The challenges listed out in the development of this sector are high land prices and rising construction costs. He further added: “The market in absolute terms will continue to grow from both supply and demand perspective. Dubai needs to position itself as a value-for-money destination offering both luxury as well as budget hotels and Dubai Expo 2020 is the platform to do so.”