Greek publican and massive hotelier Bill Gravanis covets the sun-kissed Australian landscape and is just about to spend 100 of his million dollars to get his hands on the Novotel Wollongong Northbeach Hotel from Canadian group Brookfield, after offering an aggressive $48 million for the regional hotel south of Sydney a few months back.
Brookfield secured a respectable number of hotels as part of its $410m takeover of Thakral Holdings in 2012. It recently sold the Sofitel Hotel at Broadbeach in Queensland for nearly $83m to a Chinese buyer, while it only retained the Menzies Hotel in the centre of Sydney.
The official acquisition of the 296-room hotel next March will in fact be the biggest move to date for the Oscars Hotels group. Gravanis aims at the city’s increasingly popular conference market at the same time the world is starting to notice a positive change on the business front, taking a bold step with an eye to the future.
The Greek businessman certainly understands the business of hotels. Oscars Hotel, which is headed by Bill Gravanis, who co-owns it with Mario Gravanis, controls the Southern Cross, Bankstown, Hotel Sweeneys and Camperdown Hotels as well as Bar Century and the Strattons Hotel in the Sydney CBD, Oscars Lounge Bar in Pyrmont, and the Towradgi Beach Hotel in Wollongong.