NH Hoteles - Ahorro Corporación placed a 'Buy' rating. | Accor - Morgan Stanley had an 'Equal-weight' rating and raised its target price from €33 to €35. | Sol Meliá - The share price fell to a one-month low on Wednesday. — Photo by HVS

Fattal Flies In To Hamburg To Board Airlines Hotel | There was a familiar face in the arrivals hall at Hamburg airport: the face of Fattal Hotels. The Israeli company owes its familiarity in these parts to its ownership of the Mercure Hamburg Airport. Fattal Hotels came in through the red channel as it had something to declare: its purchase, for an undisclosed sum, of the three-star Airlines Hotel Hamburg, which the company acquired from Klaus Reents. The renamed Leonardo Airport Hotel Hamburg has 37 rooms, but this number might see itself rise by 15.

Ramada And Radisson Ride Into The Republics | Here is something to mull over while you wait in Moldova: when the 140-room Ramada Chisinau City Center does arrive in the third quarter of 2010, it will be the first hotel in the eastern European republic to have an international brand. The four-star Hotel Codru, which is owned by US-based Investment Development Group, is being extensively and expensively renovated to prepare it for life as a Ramada hotel. There has been scant time to ponder in the republic of Georgia: the opening of the Radisson SAS Iveria Hotel is already upon us. The 249-room hotel in the Georgian capital Tbilisi was reworked from a Soviet-era hotel at a cost of a reported US$100 million.

Maritim Hotels A-Twitter With Joy | The good ship HMS International Hotel is free to roam where its master Maritim Hotels would love to, but, landlocked in Germany, cannot. The voyages HMS International is sent out on invariably bring home a prize; the latest is a management contract on the Hotel Esquinzo Beach on Fuerteventura, in the Canary Islands. The freshly renovated 389-room Maritim Hotel Esquinzo Beach, which is Maritim Hotels’ third hotel on Spanish soil, stands on the Jandía peninsula, on the southern shores of Fuerteventura.

A Mixture Of Salt And Sand | The Dead Sea is made that tiny bit more salty each time a hotel is opened on its shores as the proud hotelier sheds tears of joy to welcome its new little bundle. The watery eyes belong this week to InterContinental Hotels Group, which has officially opened its second Holiday Inn hotel in Jordan: the 78-room Holiday Inn Resort Dead Sea. Rezidor Hotel Group is very much alive in the United Arab Emirates, where it is to open the 312-room Park Inn Dubai Airport Free Zone in 2012.

The Hotel Clay May Now Be Thrown In The Potteries | Developer Christian Spencer Leisure has been given the go-ahead to begin phase one of the construction of a budget hotel in Fenton, on the outskirts of Stoke-on-Trent, in Staffordshire. Two acres of a five-acre site once occupied by the ceramics factory Diamond Gimson will take an initial 60 rooms, with another 20 to be added before 2012. The first 60 rooms, on which work will start this December, should be open by next summer.

Kiessling's Corner | Axa Hoteles recently opened its first two hotels: both of them in Madrid and both close to Ifema and the airport. Axor Barajas is a four-star hotel with 217 rooms, and Axor Feria a three-star hotel with 285 rooms. The total investment in the hotels was €72 million. Another hotel to have opened recently (at the start of September) is the 240-room Beatriz Albacete & Spa in Albacete (Castilla-La Mancha). Meanwhile, Grupotel has announced that the Gran Via Barcelona will open at the beginning of December. The 98-room, four-star hotel was bought for €24 million. Elsewhere, Ayre Hotels, the urban division of Fiesta Hotel Group, recently incorporated two hotels (Hotel Occidental Sevilla and Hotel Occidental Cordoba) into its portfolio. Both hotels were previously owned by Occidental. The new Ayre Hotel Sevilla has 241 rooms, and the Ayre Cordoba 351. Ayre Hotels announced, too, the opening, after renovation work, of the America building of the Gran Hotel Colon in Madrid. The hotel now has 361 rooms. By Gabriele Kiessling, Analyst, HVS Madrid

The International Hotel Conference | The International Hotel Conference has more top-quality speakers than a hi-fi superstore. After an evening spent necking cocktails on 21 October, one or two of the conference speakers might initially be a bit less responsive the next morning, but as day two of the event warms up they will undoubtedly begin to produce a sound well worth hearing: the sound of knowledgeable debate about hotel finance, development and management. The full list of speakers and details of the conference may be found on the website click here.

About HVS

HVS is the world's leading consulting and valuation services organization focused on the hotel, restaurant, shared ownership, gaming, and leisure industries. Established in 1980, the company performs more than 4,500 assignments per year for virtually every major industry participant. HVS principals are regarded as the leading professionals in their respective regions of the globe. Through a worldwide network of over 50 offices staffed by 300 experienced industry professionals, HVS provides an unparalleled range of complementary services for the hospitality industry. For further information regarding our expertise and specifics about our services, please visit www.hvs.com.