In response to an increase in international tourism to Colombia the hotel industry is growing and bringing foreign investors to the country, reported travel website Absolut Colombia.
Tourism in Colombia is drawing big business from international hotel chains. La Republica reported Thursday that the American hotel chain Sheraton will invest over $90 million (170 billion COP) in their Ocean Towers project on Avenida Bocagrande in Cartagena. The project was originally planned as one tower housing both residential apartments and hotel suites but was redesigned as two separate towers.
Newspaper El Tiempo reported that Brazilian oil and airline mogul German Efromovich was in Medellin Wednesday finalizing his company’s $26.75 million (COP50 billion) plan to purchase two major hotels in the department of Antioquia. Efromovich’s companies, New Continents and The Flagship Hotel are to take over Hotel Intercontinental in Medellin and Hotel Las Lomas in Rio Negro. Efromovich was made an honorary Colombian citizen in 2005 after his purchase of Avianca airlines in 2004.
Proexport, the institution in charge of promoting Colombian non-traditional exports, international tourism and foreign investment in Colombia, states that by 2012 hotel construction will have increased 9 percent.