Savoy Group could fetch £800m – update

The owner of the Savoy Group has denied it has any plans to sell off the hotel chain or its flagship London hotels, amid speculation that it is sounding out the market for possible buyers.

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The Savoy

New York-based investment bank Blackstone Group, which bought the Savoy Group in 1998, is understood to have appointed Deutsche Bank to advise it on its options and assess levels of interest in the market. But in a statement today, it said it and co-owner Colony Capital had "no plans for, nor have they entered into any discussions on, the sale of either the Savoy Group or any of the individual London hotels". It confirmed that Deutsche Bank was advising on the sale of the group's Lygon Arms in Broadway, Worcestershire, a process that is expected to be finalised by the end of the month. Von Essen Hotels, the privately owned country house hotel group that bought Cliveden last year, has been linked to this sale, but any sale of the rest of the portfolio, including the Savoy, Claridge's and the Connaught, if it happens at all, is thought to be a lot further off. "There has been no decision made and there is no process other than that with the Lygon Arms," said one insider. "The other big four are a separate process, but there has been no decision made on timing and there is no process underway." There has been speculation that the Lygon Arms could go for a price tag of £20m and the group as whole could be sold for as much as £800m. By Nic Paton