Rosewood Phnom Penh, one of Cambodia’s finest hotels, first opened its doors in February 2018

We examine Rosewood Hotel Group’s development pipeline and consider the potential impact of coronavirus with the help of exclusive insights from the TOPHOTELPROJECTS construction database.

Across the hospitality sector, countless businesses have been seriously affected by the Covid19 pandemic, and Rosewood is definitely not immune to the crisis either. In recent years, it’s established itself as a significant global player, with more than 40 hotels and resorts around the world, many located within Asia, North America and Europe in countries that have been hit especially hard by the virus.

A subsidiary of conglomerate Chow Tai Fook Enterprises, the private, family-controlled luxury hotel company is based in Hong Kong with additional offices in LA and Amsterdam. Arguably its best-known brand is the ultra-luxury Rosewood Hotels & Resorts, but it’s also behind the likes of contemporary deluxe New World Hotels & Resorts and business lifestyle-oriented Khos. And the business is growing rapidly, signing ten new hotel transactions in 2019 alone, and reporting on 27 February 2020 that the group’s pipeline was at its strongest level in history.

Here, we take a closer look at Rosewood’s development plans, and consider how Covid19 might impact upon the company’s ambitious growth strategy.

How many hotel projects does Rosewood have?

By delving into the TOPHOTELPROJECTS construction database, we can see that Rosewood has 31 projects in progress at the moment, with six on hold and one cancelled as of 9 July 2020.

Of its active projects, more than two-thirds (22) involve the Rosewood Hotels & Resorts brand, with four apiece for New World Hotels and PentaHotels, and one for Khos:

How might Rosewood respond to Covid19?

We ought to point out that this is just a snapshot of the current state of play at Rosewood, and it may be that further projects will be put in jeopardy if infection rates rise significantly in the group’s target markets, or investors lose confidence in the travel industry’s ability to bounce back longer term. Plus, not every decision to delay or cancel a particular scheme can be attributed to Covid19 of course, since there are plenty of other factors that can derail the development process besides health concerns.

That being said, however, it’s important to note that more than four-fifths of Rosewood’s hotel projects worldwide are still in progress at the present moment in time. This fact may well provide some measure of reassurance to those working in the hospitality industry, since our data suggests that the Hong Kong-based company will still be bringing forward plenty more schemes in the months and years ahead.