RAK to host Hotel Investors Summit in 2020

The Gulf and Indian Ocean Hotel Investors’ Summit (GIOHIS) in partnership with the Ras Al Khaimah Tourism Development Authority said that the emirate will host the summit in 2020.

GIOHIS 2020 is scheduled to be held at Al Hamra International Exhibition and Conference Centre in Ras Al Khaimah on November 23 and 24, 2020, reported Emirates news agency Wam.

The Summit is expected to attract 300-350 senior executives from the hospitality sector and at least fifty groups which invest in hospitality real estate including hotel owners and developers.

Ras Al Khaimah was recently named the "Gulf Tourism Capital" by tourism ministers and senior officials of the Gulf Cooperation Council. The emirate also recently received an ‘A’ rating by the globally recognised Fitch Ratings, for the tenth consecutive year, achieved through prudent management and a diversified economy. The emirate is considered the Arabian Gulf’s most diverse destination and will be hosting many of the region’s high-profile trade and business events, and the GIOHIS is one of numerous events coming to the Emirate in 2020.

Raki Philips, CEO of the Ras Al Khaimah Tourism Development Authority, said: "GIOHIS has become the leading investment event in the region built around hospitality real estate investors and those groups who work with them – hotel brands, consultants and advisors, the online travel agents, companies active in the sharing economy, lenders, designers and law firms. We are pleased to welcome all these groups to an emirate truly dedicated to serving them, globally recognised by Fitch Rating for its stable outlook, driven by a high GDP per capita and robust fiscal outlook."

Simon Allison, CEO of hotel owners’ network HOFTEL which runs GIOHIS, said: "We are delighted to be holding the Summit in the excellent and proven facilities in Ras Al Khaimah and will bring together senior executives from hotel owners, operators and other service providers for two days of serious debate and discussions about the topics of most relevance to the hospitality sector. The rise of the Ras Al Khaimah tourist industry in recent years is a remarkable phenomenon and we are delighted that RAK TDA will offer our delegates a range of options for experiencing it."

In a major year for inbound tourism into the UAE, with Expo 2020 taking place in Dubai, GIOHIS will scale new heights. Covering the entire Indian Ocean region, stretching from East Africa through the Indian Ocean Islands and the Gulf, to South East Asia and Australia, the summit follows the routes traced by the trading dhows in the days of the Arabian-inspired trading networks around the region.