Sol Meliá has agreed to add its first hotel in the United Arab Emirates to its hotel portfolio. The Meliá Dubai is a luxury hotel due to open at the beginning of next year and will become the first hotel run by a Spanish hotel group in the Middle East, a growing market for both domestic tourism and business travel.

The newly-built, 5 star Meliá Dubai will be operated under a management agreement in Al Raffa, Bur Dubai, opposite Port Rashid and very near the financial and cultural heart of Dubai, Heritage Villa, focus of the main tourism activity in the city.

The hotel will provide 167 rooms, an haute cuisine restaurant, Tapas Gastro Bar, 24-hour Coffee Shop, Euro-Asian fusion restaurant, sky bar, disco bar, energy bar, smoking lounge, business centre, 300 m2 for meetings and events, The Level service and spa, amongst others.

Meliá Dubai will enjoy all of the services and facilities expected of the most international of the Sol Meliá hotel brands and will become a point of reference for the Spanish hotel industry in the region. Dubai is the second most important city in the United Arab Emirates, and is now the starting point for the first Spanish hotel group to operate in the Middle East, “an emerging destination which confirms the company growth aspirations in high potential, dynamic markets”, according to Gabriel Escarrer, Chief Executive Officer of Sol Meliá.

The announcement of the addition of the Meliá Dubai confirms the growth and geographical diversification strategy of the company, involving new openings in destinations such as China, Colombia, Cabo Verde or Crete, and the renovation, improvement and rejuvenation of the hotel portfolio.