A battle is brewing at Maybourne Hotel Group between its Qatari owners and former Claridge’s owner Paddy McKillen.
The Irish property developer owned about a third of the hotel group, which includes Claridge’s, the Berkeley and Connaught, between 2004 and 2015.
In 2015 a vehicle ultimately owned by Qatar’s former prime minister, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani, and its former emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, bought the portfolio, valuing the hotels at £1.3bn.
McKillen claims he is owed billions of pounds under an agreement to share future profits struck with the Qataris at the time of the 2015 sale.
McKillen is in line for 36% of the upside valuation of the hotels minus capital expenditure. That payout could be significant, given the work his management company has carried out to add space and improve facilities, people close to McKillen claimed.
Some estimates have put a current value of more than £5bn on the hotels, although Tim Stoyle at Savills warned that luxury hotels trade so rarely “it is very hard to draw definitive trends”.
Maybourne accepts McKillen is owed something, but disagrees on how much. The two parties cannot even agree which hotels are included in the deal, with the contract definitely covering Claridge’s, the Berkeley and Connaught but, Maybourne argues, not newer luxury hotels in the US and France.
