Strong global growth driven by Africa and Asia [2/2]

For more information, see the first part of this article.

The different movements and accelerations progressively shift the breakdown of global positioning. Europe continues to be the best equipped in terms of hotel and residence supply, ahead of Asia-Pacific which has surpassed North America that has held third place for the past few years. Little by little they are giving up relative market shares, but that only rebalances the relationship between populations and hotel equipment. The situation is not at all the same for the branded hotel supply. The American continent is regaining its leadership position ahead of Asia Pacific, where groups are mostly in control. Europe is in third place on the podium, thanks to the strong presence of family operations. The penetration rates of the branded supplies are making slow progress. Technically, voluntary chains and marketing groups are not taken into consideration in the calculation for branded properties, but they ought to be included, considering the rigor of the requirements, the marketing policy and the discipline within chains. Thus, the supply in Europe would appear much better organized under brands, labels and signatures that practically have a veritable brand strategy.

The ranking of supplies by country has not changed much. The first positions are solidly held by the United States, the proportionately best equipped country in terms of hotel supply with slightly more than 5 million rooms. China is gradually catching up and leapt ahead by 800,000 new rooms in just a year, guaranteeing it will surpass 3 million next year. Italy with its million rooms, mostly in family operated properties, holds onto 3^rd place which will soon be contested by Germany whose economy hotel brand is still under development. Spain has recovered from its real estate crisis and is moving forward once again. The United Kingdom...