The Shareholders’ Meeting of Smeralda Holding – an Italian company controlled by the sovereign wealth fund Qatar Investment Authority and owner of real estate assets and land along the Costa Smeralda since 2012 – approved the 2016 financial statements, which achieved revenues of 87 million euro of euro and an Ebitda of 23 million euro, up 15%, allowing a new record of performance to be recorded.
The Smeralda Holding portfolio consists of four hotels (Cala Di Volpe, Romazzino, Pitrizza and Cervo), the Marina di Porto Cervo (one of the most important ports in the Mediterranean), a shipyard, the Pevero Golf Club, to which are added other minor assets such as shops, offices, apartments, bars, restaurants and 51% of a JV that owns 2,700 hectares of land on the coast. Three of these four hotels – Pitrizza, Cala di Volpe, Romazzino – are counted among the 10 hotels with the highest average room revenue in the world, with over 2 thousand euros per room, up to 30 thousand euros per night for villas.
In 2015, the revenues of Smeralda Holding had reached 82 million euros – of which 69 million euros for the hotel business (Cervo, Cala di Volpe, Romazzino, Pitrizza), 10 million euros from the old and new Navy and 3 million euros of euro from the minor activities constituted by the Pevero Golf Club and real estate activities.
Since May 2016, the responsibility of Smeralda Holding has been entrusted to Mario Ferraro, trustee of the new ownership and Managing Director of all the companies of the Holding. Ferraro, in the group since 2015 as general manager of Sardegna Resort, the srl that controls the 5-star hotels of the Costa Smeralda – in 2011 he was awarded as best hotel manager in Europe and has previous experience as General Manager at the JW Marriott Venice Resort & Spa, General Manager at Conrad Dubai, General Manager at the Hilton Molino Stucky Venice and as Area General Manager Sicily for THI Hotels, after being General Manager of San Domenico Palace Taormina.
“Smeralda Holding is planning – declares Mario Ferraro, managing director Smeralda Holding – an important investment plan to be used for the redevelopment and modernization of real estate assets, in full harmony and with the utmost respect for the territory, traditions and the Sardinian population. great care and attention has always “guarded” the splendid natural heritage of the Costa Smeralda – and in line with the highest standards of eco-sustainability.
The business plan focuses on lengthening the season, compared to the current four months, as in many other tourist destinations: we would like to enrich the hotels with components that are lacking today, such as a SPA in each hotel, cooking schools, extension of the component retail, an indoor pool at Cala di Volpe, realizing a diversification of the offer of restaurants and bars, with new concepts developed in-house or by importing international catering brands and, finally, creating new beach clubs.
The investment plan will also aim to create opportunities, entrepreneurial and professional, which want to involve primarily the municipalities of the Costa Smeralda and the Sardinian territory in general.
The group – which offers employment to about 1000 professionals including seasonal workers, mostly from Sardinia (around 90%) – generates an economic impact on the territory of over 20 million euros in wages and salaries and more than 23 million euro to suppliers (for 70% Sardinians), and of which about 6 million only in food & beverage. ”
Porto Cervo, May 2017