CapitaLand Investment Limited’s wholly owned lodging business unit, The Ascott Limited is acquiring Oakwood Worldwide from Mapletree Investments Pte Ltd. The completion of the transaction is slated for 3Q, 2022.
With this acquisition, Ascott will increase its global portfolio by 81 properties and around 15,000 units. And Oakwood has about 8,500 operational units with recurring fee income streams for Ascott.
Ascott’s global presence will add up to over 150,000 units in about 900 properties across 200 cities in 39 countries. New markets including Cheongju in South Korea, Zhangjiakou and Qingdao in China will be added. Other new markets include Dhaka in Bangladesh and Washington D.C. in the USA.
DestinAsian Readers’ Choice Awards 2022 recently named Oakwood the Best Serviced Residence Brand. Oakwood’s portfolio includes flagship properties Oakwood Premier Tokyo and Oakwood Premier Coex Center Seoul. There were ranked top 10 properties in their respective countries.
Oakwood Premier Melbourne has just operated for six months while Oakwood Hotel Okie Kyoto debut in Japan’s UNESCO World Heritage destination in October last year. However, Oakwood recently lost the Oakwood Premier AMTD Singapore which was rebranded to Dao by Dorsett AMTD IDEA Singapore on 1 July 2022.
Mr. Kevin Goh, CapitaLand Investment’s Chief Executive Officer for lodging shared “This acquisition of Oakwood is part of Ascott’s roadmap to playing a bigger role in the lodging market. There are significant synergies between Ascott and Oakwood, given our complementary footprint and product offerings. We intend to build on the strong reputation and heritage of the Oakwood brand, especially in markets across Southeast Asia, North Asia and North America. Oakwood will continue to grow alongside Ascott’s current portfolio of global brands as we continue to build growth momentum for our lodging business. We will be able to leverage Ascott’s extensive expertise as a global lodging player to deliver greater value to our expanded network of loyal customers and property owners.”
“Besides strategic alignment, this acquisition is also notable to Ascott commercially. Ascott’s acquisition of Oakwood brings about an immediate boost to our units under management and franchise contracts. The Oakwood portfolio will accelerate the growth of our asset-light business, with added recurring fee income streams, expanded lodging offerings and increased customer base. The strategic moves we have made in the last few years, such as our investments in Quest, Synergy and TAUZIA have charted an unprecedented growth path for Ascott,” added Mr Goh.
