Schwartz invests $70 million in Qld
PRIVATE hotel investor Dr Jerry Schwartz has made his first investment in Queensland with the $70 million purchase of the Hilton Surfers Paradise from the Chinese group, Ja Feng.
The Hilton Surfers Paradise features conference and function facilities which comprise of a ballroom for up to 220 banquet-style or up to 350 cocktails, a pre-function lobby, three smaller breakout suites, a theatre, and an outside area of 1,500m2 called The Deck.
Schwartz said that the destination is ideally positioned to “take advantage of the boom in international travel from Asia and the Pacific”.
Business surge for Tas
Business Events Tasmania (BET) hosted around 130 conferences and events across the state in 2018, with BET CEO Marnie Craig saying, “we have noticed a significant increase in interest from the corporate and incentive market and with their shorter lead times we expect that the confirmed number of events will continue to increase over the next six months”.
Craig added that in 2019 BET will be focusing on “positioning ourselves for the increase in hotels that will be coming online in 2020”.
BET will be taking a strategic approach to promoting Tasmania with increased in-market activity, sales campaigns and ensuring BET has the correct product for corporate and incentive markets.
Space agency for Adelaide
Adelaide has been named as the future home to Australia’s new $41m Space Agency, set to open later this year.
The Agency will employ 20 people to regulate, licence and assess space-related activities conducted by private industry.
“The Space Agency location announcement truly is the ultimate legacy…. and it presents a huge opportunity for the Adelaide Convention Bureau,” said Adelaide Convention Bureau CEO Damien Kitto, adding “following the massive investment in infrastructure in the BioMed City, this development has opened the doors to the Bureau now having a huge asset to utilise when seeking to attract space and related industry events to Adelaide”.
