Unpacking the growth of hotel chains in Africa: Enterprises and patterns

Abstract

The internationalization of hotel chains is a topic of rising interest in tourism research. Existing literature mainly focuses, however, on the internationalization of hotel chains based in North America and Europe. Over the past two decades Africa has been one of the most rapidly expanding regions of the global tourism industry. This growth has triggered the entry and expansion of both international and regional hotel chains. Against this background, the aim in this article is to provide an exploratory analysis of hotel chain development in Africa. The findings show that Accor, Starwood, and Hilton are the leading hotel chains in terms of operations across different African countries. Nevertheless, in terms of total numbers of hotels, the largest operators are Protea and Tsogo Sun, both chains which are based in South Africa. In terms of spatial distribution the largest clusters of hotel chains occur in South Africa, Egypt, Morocco and Nigeria. Overall, attention is drawn to Africa as a region of growing competition by international and Africa-based hotel groups and of the need for more research on the internationalization of hotels in Africa.