K Hospitality Pte Ltd (K Hotel), a Singapore-based hospitality firm with around 300 beds across six properties, has announced the appointment of Noel Neo as CFO of K Hospitality and CEO of investment advisory affiliate – K Hotel Advisors.
Noel joins from Stewardship Asia Centre, a subsidiary of Temasek Holdings, and was previously research chief at the Asia Pacific Real Estate Association. He was earlier in his career with private equity fund manager – Pacific Star Holdings, and SGX-listed Pacific Star Development.
Ken Cai, CEO of K Hotel, said “Noel has been consulting with us for a year and he was tremendously helpful in securing our seed financing of $2m. This has enabled us to weather the COVID storm better than many of our peers and be in a position to emerge stronger from the crisis.”
Noel Neo, CFA, elaborated “K Hotel is a great company with a very dynamic team. We raised our seed round in August 2019 and completed a follow on offering in April 2020. It is a testament to K Hotel’s track record and growth potential that our investors who comprise luminaries in the real estate industry chose to back the company at the height of the COVID pandemic.”
Ken shared, “K Hotel is fortunate to be operating in Singapore, where the government has been extremely proactive in managing the pandemic and supporting the populace during the resulting economic fallout. This has enabled us to give back to the community in turn, such as our tie up with Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) as well as Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) – such as Project Providence, to provide discounted accommodation for foreigners who find themselves stranded.”
Noel said, “The hospitality market has been devastated by COVID and the resulting restrictions on international travel. We are seeing the emergence of a number of really unique opportunities to purchase quality assets at substantive discounts to stable market value and position for the recovery from the pandemic.”
“Given the battered state of the hospitality market, K Hotel is also accelerating plans for Series A fund raising. This is a once in decades opportunity for hospitality firms like us to grow. For investors, this would be a non-capital intensive way to gain exposure to a potentially explosive recovery play on the most beat-down sector of this crisis.”, Noel added.
