Renad Ghanem Saudi Gazette JEDDAH — Saudi hospitality sector is attracting more investments and investors amid robust growth, and many of the international companies are targeting the Kingdom as its sector is considered as one of the biggest in the Middle East. In the recently held The Hotel Show Saudi Arabia 2015 in Jeddah, Christine Davidson, Event Director of the Show, said: “We are pleased with the quality of visitors to this year's event and the feedback we have received from them. The introduction of the Vision Conference has proved very popular and as the appetite for content and insight has clearly been demonstrated this year, we will certainly bring it back in a much bigger way for 2016. There are a number of other exciting initiatives planned for 2016 which will continue to increase visitor and exhibitor engagement and improve return on financial and time investment made by all concerned – providing hospitality professionals even more reasons to participate. We will announce these in the following weeks.” John Suzara, Event Manager, dmg events, the organizing company, told the Saudi Gazette “our main purpose is the entire hospitality sector in the kingdom starting from technology to interior design to outdoor, but in this edition we have added import exhibition conference.” He said when it comes to hospitality market in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia is regarded as the biggest. “I think 50 percent of our participants this year are from technology. Modern technology is now booming in Saudi Arabia as a lot of hotels now presents the latest in technology to their customers,” he noted. Many of the leading international technology companies that participated in the Show are catering also to other international markets. Jon Johnston, Senior Vice President of Electric Mirror, told the Saudi Gazette: “Electric Mirror is a manufacturer of lighted mirrors and mirror TV technology. We sell to the hotels all over the world, we featured in hotels in Riyadh, Jeddah an also in Makkah. We specialized in high luxury products.” He added that “we have an office in Dubai and have been in the Middle East for eight years.” The luxury Electric Mirror head office is in Seattle, Washington D.C. and has also other offices in Dubai, London and Hong Kong, supplying the luxury hotels, Four Seasons for one, all over the world. Khaled AbdulKader, Country Manager, Hoistlocatel, a hospitality innovation company, said “we are manufacturing and doing interactive TV solutions, hotel innovation system and solutions. Locatel is a French company started in 1949 and now is merged with Hoist IT Swedish company and it became HoistLoctel. Hoist does other works from IT and property management solutions,” Khaled added. Eric Roger, Regional Head EMEA at FCS, said “the exhibition is very successful and the quality of the attendance is very high as always. It's important to come to this market and show up our desire to work in this market.” FCS is a leading global provider of comprehensive hospitality guest services applications and solution design services for individual hotels, international chain hotels and integrated resorts. With three decades of experience, it has provided extensive solutions to more than 5,000 hotels with over 8,000 installations in 32 countries. Hee Jin Moon, B2B & IT Director, LG Electronics Saudi Arabia LLC, said it's their third time to participate in the Show, and showcased its hotel TV technology.
