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I recently attended a team building program in Chicago. 130 participants from a major financial lending institution came together to take part in a team building activity to help build teamwork, relieve stress, and give back to the community.

I recently attended a team building program in Chicago. 130 participants from a major financial lending institution came together to take part in a team building activity to help build teamwork, relieve stress, and give back to the community. I was overwhelmed by the amount of energy and excitement that took over the room when they learned that the bikes they were about to build were going to be donated to underprivileged kids from the local chapter of Big Brothers Big Sisters.

EV HOTELS, A new technology-centric hotel brand founded by Ken Patel, is entering the "metaverse" by way of a partnership with "metavestor" club BAPESWORLD. Patel said his will be the first hotel company to play in the still fluidly defined metaverse, essentially a combination of online gaming, virtual reality, cyber meeting spaces and ecommerce. When completed, EV Hotels will include a "crypto trade floor" in partnership with EV Hotel has partnered with cryptocurrency and NFT exchange Chicago Digital Exchange where the crypto trading community can meet in person to share information and expertise. Individual traders and companies will be able to buy membership trading rights through CDX that will include discounted exchange fees and other exchange amenities at the EV Hotel trading floors. Under the new agreement, BAPES will be featured in the "non-fungible tokens" lobby where it will have NFTs for sale for in-person and in the metaverse. "Ventures like this are new to the hospitality and digital world, and that is why I am excited to announce the partnership between EV Hotel and BAPE," Patel said. "This sort of partnership usually does not come to market, and to have metaverse in the same sentence with hospitality is unheard of. The world's first hotel brand to hit the metaverse. What we are doing is to create an experience that brings hospitality back and gives it life again. Innovation is a team sport, and this venture merges the capabilities of our respective teams."

U.S. HOTEL PERFORMANCE rose from the previous week, while occupancy and RevPAR levels reached the second highest of the year, behind the week ending 18 March, according to STR's latest data through 22 April. Occupancy for the week ending April 22 came in at 67.2 percent, up from 64.2 percent the week before, and increased 2.3 percent than the comparable week in 2022. ADR stood at $155.76, up from $155.33 the previous week and 4.2 percent over the same period in 2022. RevPAR was $104.64, also up from $99.67 the week before and 6.6 percent rise over 2022. Among the Top 25 Markets, Chicago posted the highest year-over-year increases in each of the key performance metrics: occupancy rose 23.9 percent to 72.2 percent, while ADR increased 29.6 per cent to $174.71. RevPAR also rose 60.6 percent to $126.13. Notably, New York City (82.1 percent) and Las Vegas (80.8 percent) were the only two markets to report occupancy above 80 percent.

SHATTERPROOF, A NATIONAL nonprofit addressing the U.S. addiction crisis, will recognize Mark Hoplamazian, president and CEO of Hyatt Hotels Corp., for his contributions to mobilizing hospitality leaders to raise awareness and challenge the stigma surrounding addiction. The event will be during Shatterproof's seventh annual Hospitality Heroes Reception on Jan. 23 during the Americas Lodging Investment Summit at the J.W. Marriott in Los Angeles. Hoplamazian and Hyatt have been longtime supporters of Shatterproof and its mission to end the addiction crisis, Shatterproof said. Recently, Hyatt served as the presenting sponsor for Shatterproof's annual walk in Chicago, the city where Hyatt is headquartered. The upcoming event aims to generate funds supporting Shatterproof's initiatives to reshape how addiction is treated in America. In 2023, Hyatt and more than 60 hospitality companies sponsored the event in solidarity with Shatterproof's mission and its founder and CEO, Gary Mendell-a former hotelier and chairman of HEI Hotels & Resorts, according to Shatterproof. Moreover, the event raised more than $2 million, contributing to solutions for addiction and addressing the public health crisis in the U.S.

REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT competition She Has a Deal (SHaD) started a 10-city tour of U.S. cities to raise equity capital under the name "SHaD Prosperity Fund I." The funds will support women-led hotel projects, a statement said. The tour kicks off in Miami on Feb. 11 and will be open to small groups of qualified individual investors, family offices, small entities and trusts. Cities on the tour include Cleveland, Phoenix, Dallas, New York, Atlanta, Chicago, as well as Oakland, California; Louisville, Kentucky; and Washington, D.C. It will finish in the first week of April. According to SHaD, each event will include a preview of the women-led hotel deals being pitched by participants in the 2022 She Has a Deal pitch competition. "Launching SHaD Prosperity Fund I is the next logical step in the SHaD mission. Now that we have created a powerful platform to expose more women to hotel ownership and educate them about the process, I want to ensure that capital is available for the women to close their hotel deals," said SHaD founder Tracy Prigmore. "This investment vehicle marries two of my passions: creating investment vehicles that open the doors of hotel investing to more people and increasing the number of women owning and developing hotels. The ability to create passive income for investors while leading social change is inspiring."

DALLAS-BASED INVESTMENT firm NewcrestImage became the second largest shareholder in TiffinLabs, a Singapore-based food tech company which operates food delivery-focused virtual restaurant brands, a statement said. Founded in 2020, TiffinLabs introduced numerous virtual brands across Singapore and Malaysia. It started U.S. expansion in Dallas in 2021 and now operates in Chicago, Detroit, Knoxville, and Charlotte. By 2023, it expects to have 1,000 digital storefronts globally and to be operating in 30 U.S. cities. "TiffinLabs offers hotels and restaurants a low cost, turn-key source of incremental revenue for post-pandemic recovery, while for us as investors, TiffinLabs represents a strategic opportunity for long-term growth," said Mital Patel, managing partner of NewcrestImage. Because of the company's shareholder position, Patel now becomes a board member of TiffinLabs.

STR HAS UNVEILED the forward-looking component of its product "Forward STAR" in 104 new markets/submarkets across the U.S. and Canada. Forward STAR, which is presently live in 450 areas around the globe, allows hotel property and portfolio users to benchmark the next 365 days of occupancy on the books against the competition and market. "This launch represents our largest Forward STAR expansion to date and adds significant value to our overall benchmarking offering," said Amanda Hite, STR's president. "Adding to the historical data that drives so many operational decisions around the industry, this directly sourced forward data provides intel into where hotels can gain available business, adjust their approach to pricing, and implement actions around market events. When combining historical metrics, profitability data and these forward bookings insights, industry stakeholders are positioned to analyze performance from every angle." According to the statement, Forward STAR was launched in 17 of the country's 25 largest hotel markets, including Las Vegas, New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Boston and Phoenix. More granular submarkets were added with the addition of central business districts in markets such as Austin, Chicago, Nashville and New Orleans as well as airport submarkets in areas such as Miami, San Francisco and Bradenton, Florida.

A LAWSUIT FILED in federal court in Washington state alleges that STR, owned by commercial real estate information researcher CoStar Group, along with several major hotel companies conspired to inflate luxury hotel rates. The seven individuals named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit seek to make it a class-action filing on behalf of every person who stayed at the defendants' hotels from February 2020 until the present for an unspecified amount. CoStar and hotel companies including IHG Hotel & Resorts, Marriott International and Hyatt Hotels Corp., entered an exchange of "competitively-sensitive information about their prices, supply, and future plans" in violation of the antitrust provisions of the Sherman Act, according to the lawsuit. STR and most of the other defendants in the suit did not respond to requests for comment in time for this article, but a spokesperson for IHG said the company could not comment on pending litigation. "Teddy Roosevelt passed the antitrust laws to prevent titans of industry from price fixing in smoke-filled rooms," Steve Berman, the plaintiffs' lead attorney told Reuters, calling the defendants' conduct the "modern equivalent." The alleged price fixing happened in major cities including Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Diego, Denver, Washington, D.C., and Seattle. The lawsuit focuses on STR's "Forward STAR" product that was expanded into many of those markets in April after launching 17 of the country's 25 largest hotel markets, including Las Vegas, New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Boston and Phoenix.

American Airlines is one of the leading airlines in the world. With its headquarters in Fort Worth, Texas, American airlines operates an extensive International and Domestic network with its flights to North America, the Caribbean, South America, Europe, and Asia. American airline probably is the only airline that operates with Five hubs in Dallas/Fort Worth, New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and Chicago.

THE U.S. HOTEL industry showed improved performance in May compared to the same month last year, according to CoStar. All three performance metrics-occupancy, ADR, and RevPAR-increased year-over-year. The top 25 markets reported higher occupancy and ADR than all other markets. Occupancy increased to 65.7 percent in May, up from 65.2 percent in April, and increased by 1.5 percent compared to May 2023. ADR climbed to $160.40 from $157.31 the previous month, a 2.4 percent rise from 2023. RevPAR reached $105.46, up from $102.51 the preceding month, reflecting a 4 percent increase from May of the previous year. Among the top 25 markets, New York City led in all three key performance metrics: occupancy rose 5.8 percent to 88.9 percent, ADR increased 6.3 percent to $339.25, and RevPAR climbed 12.5 percent to $301.57. Markets with the lowest occupancy for the month included Detroit at 46.1 percent and Chicago at 49.4 percent.

THE HISTORY OF Indian immigrants in the U.S. could fill several books, but Mahendra Doshi has captured a core aspect of it with his book "Surat to San Francisco: How the Patels from Gujarat Established the Hotel Business in California 1942-1960." The book is, as the title says, the story of the individuals who first left their home for a roundabout journey to the American Dream. Doshi is journalist in San Jose, California, not a businessman himself, but he is originally from Vadia in the Indian state of Gujarat. His family moved to Calcutta in West Bengal where Doshi earned degrees from Presidency College and the University of Calcutta before moving to the U.S. in 1967 and eventual graduated with a master's degree from the University of Nevada, Reno. "I have never even thought of business. I had a degree in journalism and I did marketing work for General Motors. That's where I made my living for 30 years," Doshi said. "At the same time, I pursued my journalistic impulses. I wrote for mostly all those ethnic papers, Indian ethnic papers like India Times of Chicago and India West and India Post." Doshi also published two "Who's Who among Indians" lists in 1976 and 1981. That whet his appetite for exploring his people's history.

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