NH Hotels Plots Takeover Bid for Jolly

Grande Jolly, in which NH Hotels has a majority holding, has submitted the prospectus for a takeover bid for the shares of Jolly Hotels held by minority shareholders to the CONSOB (the body that governs the securities market in Italy), in line with the plans for the Spanish company to acquire Jolly Hotels.

Last November, NH Hotels, Banca Intesa and Joker signed a master agreement whereby they set up the company Grande Jolly (NH Italia 51 percent, Joker 42 percent and Banca Intesa 7 percent), for the purpose of controlling around 75 percent of the capital of the hotel chain Jolly Hotels.

On January 31, the Italian competition authority, the Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato, gave the green light for the setting up of the new company Grande Jolly, as a result of which the requirement for starting the operations to take over Jolly Hotels was fulfilled.

In this context, NH Hotels, via the company Grande Jolly, has submitted the prospectus for a takeover bid for all the shares held by minority shareholders (5,104,578 shares representing 25.6 percent of Jolly Hotels).

The price per share set in the Bid will be €25 which, in compliance with European Law, is the same as the price paid to the founding shareholders of Grande Jolly, thus ensuring that all shareholders are treated on an equal footing. The operation will involve a total outlay of €127.6 million, in the event that all the shares covered by the bid take it up.

NH Hotels recently submitted a three-year expansion plan in which a major portion of its investments are to go to Italy. Around 25 percent of the investments provided for in the plan will be made in the Italian market, where NH Hotels plans to have more than 14,000 rooms by the end of 2009.

This operation, when added to the operation recently concluded between NH Hotels and the Framon hotel chain, means that the Spanish company will be operating around 56 hotels at major destinations in Italy, which puts it in a position to take the lead in the much needed concentration of the fragmented hotel market in that country.