North Wind Capital and Banor Alternative Assets to launch a £500m pan-European hospitality fund

London – December 2023: North Wind Capital (“NWC”) and Banor Capital (“BC”), through Banor Alternative Assets , have formed a new joint venture (“JV”) for the co-investment in a selection of pan-European hospitality assets, in the view of eventually jointly launching a fund targeting small and mid-sized hotels locked in distressed capital structures (the “Fund”).

NWC has initially committed £25 million to co-invest alongside Banor Alternative Assets , which will match NWC’s investments in the joint transactions.

The JV will eventually aim to assemble a hotel portfolio with a Gross Asset Value (“GAV”) of around £500 million with a focus on the UK, Southern Europe and Italy.

The investment strategy will target hotels with multiple demand drivers, branding potential, and clear value-add opportunities that are burdened by distressed capital structures or managed by inefficient operators. These will include hotels over-encumbered by debt and capex-starved post-COVID. Asset business plans will involve capital structure stabilisation, targeted capex investment, performance improvement through implementing operational efficiencies and rebranding.

The JV will source assets ‘off-market’ through its combined investor network and bid on deals among a limited pool of pre-qualified investors, providing a unique and extensive investment pipeline.

Ben Williams, CEO at North Wind Capital, comments: “Legacy pandemic-era sector disruption led to a backlog of sellers that deferred exits awaiting market stabilisation. At the same time, the specialist operational acumen required to manage hotels limits competition among mid-market assets. Together, these market dynamics create market pricing dislocation, opening the door for specialist hospitality investors like us to capitalise on, as travel demand for business and leisure recovers.”

ENDS.