The CEO of Eight Continents Hotels & Resorts aims to grow the company through acquisitions while improving its cashflow.
In an interview with CoStar News Hotels, Haninder Sachdeva, the chief executive of the hotel ownership and management company, said he's also looking at deals in Africa, more opportunities in India and management deals in Europe. The company, with headquarters in Manchester and Gurugram, India, has a burgeoning portfolio in the United Kingdom, and also in India and Zanzibar.
“In Switzerland, we’ve started negotiations. Middle East demand is driving Switzerland,” he said.
In October 2025, Eight Continents acquired the 38-room La Barbarie Hotel in St. Martin, Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands, a U.K. crown dependency close to France. The attraction of Guernsey is that it is a financial hub but one with other pockets of untapped demand, he said.
“There are 1,400 different institutions," he said. “Operating a hotel there is more lucrative, and there is a mix of business and leisure. Added to that, I do not think anyone has tapped into its request-for-proposal business. La Barbarie’s corporate business is less than 8%.”
Eight Continents has always wanted to be in Guernsey, Sachdeva said, pointing to the hotel market's average daily rate and overall demand.
“When [La Barbarie Hotel] came to market, it had been No. 1 on TripAdvisor for many years. On top of being well-managed and kept in good shape by the previous owners, the hotel's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization was healthy,” he said.
When it comes to deals, Eight Continents is opportunistic, Sachdeva said.
“Our strategy is to have 50 hotels by 2030, but Guernsey was pure opportunity," he said. "It was not in the plan, but when the chance came, we knew we did not want to miss it."
Sachdeva said he hopes for more airlift to the island, adding it's at a disadvantage to neighboring Jersey. The United Kingdom is both islands’ chief feeder market.
Eight is great
There's meaning behind the Eight Continents Hotels & Resorts name, Sachdeva said.
“Number eight is my favorite number, it is the date of my birth, and the company is named for Zelandia,” he said, referring to the submerged continental shelf off the coast of Australia and New Zealand that some people consider to be the eighth continent.
“The Chinese consider the number eight as lucky. It is a business number,” he added.
The origins of the business might easily have been less lucky, Sachdeva said. Eight Continents was founded pre-pandemic in January 2020.
“We were a management consultancy company, but I decided to start my own business connecting owners with brands," he said. "The pandemic, though, stopped everything, so we decided to be an operator, and during the lockdown we decided to be the manager. I saw after the 2008 [global financial crisis] that the bounce-back was stronger. No one knew how long it would take to rebound after the pandemic, but we took a shot at it in August 2020."
Sachdeva added that in hindsight that downtime, with everyone sitting at home, allowed him the time to develop Eight Continents’ framework.
“That gave us time to have a 360-degree view, to understand what we wanted to launch, and we took a bold step to launch on three different continents,” he said.
Indian guests, be they from India or within its diaspora, understand the DNA of the firm, Sachdeva said.
“Between 50% to 60% of hotel owners in East Africa are Indian owners. In 2021, we took the entire back office to India, a strategic move to allow us to have a bigger footprint there, to save on our bottom line and to provide a better [return on investment] impact on conversions,” he said.
In India, Eight Continents is focused on leisure hotels in secondary cities.
“We seek experience-led hotels and class ourselves as bucket-list hotels. An example would be a great property close to a tiger reserve,” he said.
Eight Continents also pioneered stargazing in light pollution-free areas of India, Sachdeva said.
The firm has numerous brands to play with from the midscale to the luxury segment, including Naaz, Tree Top, Stamps and Legacy by Eight Continents, as well as eponymous brand Eight Continents Hotels & Resorts.
Across its portfolio of open hotels and properties in development, Eight Continents has 12 hotels in Asia — 10 in India and two in The Maldives — six hotels in Europe and two in Africa. One of its upcoming hotels is Naaz Zanzibar, which is expected to open in 2027. Design often is traditional and in keeping with hotels’ locations, he said, and the firm also operates in-house restaurant brand Firangis.
It owns three of those hotels: La Barbarie; the 18-room Taychreggan, Signature Collection by Eight Continents, on Loch Awe near Oban, Scotland, which dates to 1753; and the 34-room Episode Hotel Royal Lemington Spa in Warwickshire, England, which dates to 1820.
“We are acquiring a fourth hotel, The Vincent, in Southport, close to both Manchester and Liverpool. It has golf business and is close to the sea, away from the hustle and bustle,” Sachdeva said of the 59-room hotel.
Indian incidences
The growth of the company's Indian portfolio came with challenges, Sachdeva said, but it was fueled by Eight Continents’ optimism and bravado.
“The first hotel we signed in India was in 2021. The hotel was not 100% ready. Before us, no brand would come in, but we wanted to showcase what we can do, and it is still not fully open," he said. "Last year, we opened its spa and banquet hall, and the hotel gets 60% to 65% occupancy, when the average in the area is 40%.
“The owner is well-connected. His father was a forest officer, and it is still part of a national park. We came up with the idea of having solar power, and he said, ‘Why not?’ His father still liaises with the heads of local villages, and 60% of staff is local. We organize village tours and dinners with locals, with whom we profit share,” he said.
One Eight Continents hotel that did not work out was located in Romania in an UNESCO heritage site but too close to Ukraine, Sachdeva said. He added he is looking at similar destinations in Commonwealth of Independent States nations and in Eastern Europe as part of a partnership.
“Hospitality is always challenging. Running costs are always high, and the biggest of those are payroll, heat and power,” he said.