Aboudi Asali to head MEASA development team at Jumeirah
Jumeirah Group has appointed Aboudi Asali as Senior Vice President Development for the Middle East, Africa and South Asia (MEASA) region.
Asali is responsible for driving the expansion of the Jumeirah brand across the region, as he takes up the leadership of the MEASA development team from Cherif Hosny, who left the company in August 2014. He joins Jumeirah with a 20-year career in hospitality, which includes senior appointments in the Middle East and Europe.
Having started in hotels in the USA and Saudi Arabia, Asali worked as a hospitality consultant for Andersen until 2002. He then joined Marriott International as Vice President International Lodging Development and structured a dedicated development team for the Middle East region. In this role he negotiated and signed management agreements for over 40 hotels, including the 1,608-room JW Marriott Marquis in Dubai.
Since 2012 Asali has run Aprio Hotel Advisory Services advising hotel owners and developers in the EMEA region on the operator selection and contract negotiations. Recent projects have included the Inter Continental Dubai Marina and Sheraton Juba, South Sudan.
Speaking on the appointment of Asali, Group Chief Development Officer Robert Swade comments: “Jumeirah’s growth strategy is focused on expansion in MEASA and Asia in particular. Aboudi’s extensive experience of the market in the MEASA region and his engagement in some of the most significant recent deals gives Jumeirah an unrivalled opportunity to attract a wide range of potential development partners and build up a strong pipeline of future openings.”
Jumeirah Group currently operates 22 hotels and has management agreements to operate a further 17 hotels, which are under development. These include eight in the MEASA region: two in Muscat, Oman; two in Marrakech, Morocco; and one each in Abu Dhabi, UAE; Aqaba, Jordan; Mumbai, India; and Mauritius. In addition the group is expanding its footprint of owned assets in Dubai with the construction of a 430-room luxury hotel to complete the Madinat Jumeirah Arabian Resort and a new 350-room hotel near Jumeirah Beach Hotel.
