UOL Continues Hospitality Expansion With $56M Double-Barreled Jakarta Deal

Less than two months after buying a $771 million site in central Singapore, SGX-listed UOL Group has taken its 2018 expansion program to Jakarta by purchasing 180 apartments at the city’s Thamrin Nine development and inking a deal to manage a five-star hotel within the 470,000 square metre mega-project.

The top five Singapore home-builder has agreed to pay $56.3 million to Indonesian textile maker-turned-developer Putragaya Wahana to purchase the residential units within Tower 2 of the multi-building complex, according to an announcement by UOL. The developer  also signed a management contract to operate another part of the same tower under its Parkroyal Hotels division.

The Indonesian transactions follow UOL hospitality deals in Myanmar and Australia within the last 15 months as the Singaporean player continues to grow its regional hotel footprint.

SG Group Grows Hospitality Business in Indonesia

“The latest acquisition of an asset and signing of a management contract in Thamrin Nine will strengthen the Group’s hospitality footprint in Jakarta, bringing the total number of owned/managed hotels and serviced suites in the city to three,” UOL Deputy Chief Executive Officer Liam Wee Sin said in a statement. “Our venture in Jakarta forms part of our strategic growth to increase the number of owned hotels and secure more hotel management agreements, enlarging our Pan Pacific and Parkroyal brand presence in the region,” he added.

UOL’s new apartments are within the 5.4 hectare Thamrin Nine complex on the Indonesian capital’s Jalan Thamrin, about 500 metres south of Plaza Indonesia and Selamat Datang Monument. The location is within walking distance of both the soon-to-be-completed Dukuh Atas MRT and the BNI City railway station.

The mixed-use project is anchored by the UOB Plaza office building, which has served as the Indonesian headquarters of UOL sister company UOB bank since 2007. UOL’s hospitality assets are within the complex’ 62-storey Tower 2 which began construction in 2016.  Together with the 70-storey Thamrin Nine Tower 1, which started construction in 2014, the pair of Kohn Pedersen Fox-designed skyscrapers form the latest addition to a project that broke ground in 1997. The mixed-use complex will include offices and retail space in addition to hotels and serviced apartments.

According to the company announcement, the apartments purchased have a total semi-gross floor area (SGFA) of 15,366 square metres (165,398 square feet). The assets are to be held under a 30-year extendable lease and will be operated on a serviced-apartment basis from 2022 under the company’s Parkroyal brand. Putragaya Wahana, the developer of Thamrin Nine and previously a textile company,  was the seller in the transaction.

The hotel will be run under the Parkroyal name as well and will have 200 rooms in total.

One in a series and the Third in Indonesia

UOL is the parent company of the Pan Pacific and Parkroyal hotel groups. At the end of 2017, Pan Pacific hotels had a total 20 properties and Parkroyal had 13 hotels and resorts. Between them, the brands have eight hotels in China (where the group has been since the 1996), five in Vietnam and five in Malaysia.

UOL has been on a regional expansion drive in recent years. In 2017,  it purchased the 396-room Melbourne Hilton for $175 million, and opened the 336-room Pan Pacific Yangon in late 2017. The company had earlier increased its stake in the Pan Pacific Yangon from 20 percent to 40 percent and now has three hotels in Myanmar,

Pan Pacific Serviced Suites,  UOL’s first hospitality asset in Indonesia, has been in development since 2017 and is set to open with 179 units in 2020. The apartments will be located in the North Tower of Indonesia-1, also on Jalan Thamrin and to be the city’s largest twin tower when completed. Including the two properties at Thamrin Nine, UOL currently has three hospitality assets in the country under development.