Despite downsizing from 207 hotels to 120 two years ago, Sofitel is currently looking at expanding across the Middle East.
Sofitel vice president Middle East, Africa and Indian Ocean Sami Nasser confirmed: “We are looking all around the region, and I am really pushing to be in Syria when it will be quiet, of course I would also like us to be in Saudi Arabia — you cannot not be in Saudi Arabia.”
“We actually already have one property opened over there, in Al Khobar, which is doing very well but we would like to be in Makkah and also in Riyadh. Then we are looking at Jordan, and further afield South Africa, because that is also my region,” he added.
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Sofitel dropped a number of its hotels several years as part of its repositioning into the luxury tier, and Nasser said that all the new hotels would be “new generation Sofitels”.
“We have a target, but we will not just go for things to have them open because we really would like to have the right hotels so we have to wait or to provoke the opportunities so that we have the right hotel and the right owner – this is really important,” Nasser concluded.
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