(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) Bin Otaiba Group will invest Dh800 million to build a luxury hotel and beech villas on Saadiyat Island to cash in on the tourism surge in the region. The Abu Dhabi-based group will start the construction of the project in the fourth quarter of 2013, sources said.
Tourism Development and Investment Company (TDIC), master developer of major tourism, cultural and residential destinations in Abu Dhabi, confirmed on Sunday the sale of a 91,000-square-metre land plot on Saadiyat island to Bin Otaiba Investment Group, a leading UAE-based developer for the development of a five-star luxury resort.
The hotel, scheduled to open in 2015, will comprise 366 rooms and luxury beach villas. The luxury project would offer restaurants, a spa centre and state-of-the-art gymnasium, conference facilities that can accommodate up to 800 guests. Other features would include unique sand-bottom swimming pool, gardens, water features etc.
Commenting on his investment, Khalaf bin Ahmad Al Otaiba, chairman of Bin Otaiba Investment Group, promised excellence, luxury and innovation.
"The new five-star hotel will reflect high standards, especially since it will be positioned among TDIC's distinctive world-class cultural, leisure, hospitality and residential developments on Saadiyat," Al Otaiba said.
The group, which includes a portfolio of distinctive properties and hotels across the UAE, such as Hilton Sharjah, Millennium Hotel Abu Dhabi, and Embassy Suites Hotel in Sharjah, is currently in the final stage of appointing a well-renowned operator.
This new development will follow strict compliance with TDIC's high standards of construction and design guidelines, to ensure the ecosystem remains intact. Particular attention is focused on TDIC's turtle conservation programme which respects the nesting and hatching seasons.
Tourism investment
Abu Dhabi is spending billions of dirham into its tourism infrastructure to handle 4.9 million tourists by 2020.
Currently under way is the multi-billion dollar re-development and expansion of Abu Dhabi International Airport designed to increase the overall capacity of the airport to more than 40 million passengers per year. A second runway and a third terminal have been already been completed.
Abu Dhabi Airports Company in 2012 saw 18.9 per cent growth in passenger traffic compared to 2011. Ali Al Hammadi, deputy managing director of TDIC, said that the sale of land to Bin Otaiba Investment Group reassures the leading position of Saadiyat as a strategic location for investment and an ideal residential and tourism destination.
This new resort is a valuable addition to the current hotel capacity at Saadiyat, and the island's top-class sport and leisure facilities - such as the region's first championship beachfront golf course, Saadiyat Beach Golf Club, and the world's first Monte-Carlo Beach Club outside of Monaco, the Monte-Carlo Beach Club, Saadiyat, which are making Saadiyat a very appealing residential and tourism address.
The Saadiyat Cultural District is set to become an internationally renowned arts hub featuring world-class museums, which will open on the island starting with the Louvre Abu Dhabi in 2015, and followed by Zayed National Museum in 2016 and Guggenheim Abu Dhabi in 2017.
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