Northstar Travel Group Acquires Burba Hotel Network’s Hotel Investment Event Portfolio

Date: May 2017

Location: USA – Global

What: Burba Hotel Network (BHN) announced that its hotel investment event portfolio has been acquired by Northstar Travel Group. This acquisition was completed in collaboration with BHN’s partners, including the American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA).

BHN produces 10 hospitality investment events and conferences around the world, including Los Angeles, Miami, Hong Kong, Singapore, London and Mumbai. This partnership makes events the largest segment of Northstar’s business.

Jim Burba, founder and president, and Bob Hayes, VP of Burba Hotel Network, and their entire team will continue to run the BHN events working with Northstar Travel Group. Northstar, the leading information, event, marketing solutions and technology provider to the global travel and meetings industry will be able to leverage its databases, relationships, media properties and domain expertise to help grow the BHN event portfolio.

BHN’s global portfolio of events include: the Americas Lodging Investment Summit (ALIS) in Los Angeles; ALIS Law in Los Angeles; ALIS Summer Update; Alternative Ownership Conference Asia Pacific (AOCAP) in Singapore; Caribbean Hotel & Resort Investment Summit (CHRIS) in Miami; Hotel Investment Conference Asia Pacific (HICAP) in Hong Kong; HICAP UPDATE in Singapore; Hotel Investment Forum India (HIFI) in Mumbai; Hotel Opportunities Latin America (HOLA) conference in Miami; and Hotel Investment Conference Europe (Hot.E) in London.

As part of this acquisition, Northstar and AHLA have entered into a long-term partnership agreement to co-produce the ALIS Group of Events in the US.

Houlihan Lokey represented BHN and its partners in the transaction. Paul Hastings LLP provided legal advice to BHN, Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott LLC provided legal advice to AHLA.

Macquarie Capital provided financing for Northstar, and Jones Day served as legal advisor to Northstar.

THPT Comment: Macquarie of course being no strangers to providing funds/finance for several hotels.  With Questex’s acquisition of UK’s Annual Hotel Conference in 2016 and their ownership of Hotel Management magazine and Berlin’s IHIF – International Hotel & Investment Forum (and 120 other Conferences and tradeshows), these two now control the hotel investment agenda.

First Seen: HotelNewsNow