Hyatt Corp. scales back deal with Wichita’s LodgeWorks on Astini News
The Hyatt Corp.'s purchase of 24 hotels from LodgeWorks LP has been modified to include four fewer hotels and a reduction in the overall price.
The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Hyatt filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday a revised deal worth $661 million, rather than the $802 million in the initial plan.
LodgeWorks' headquarters is in Wichita. It employs about 60 people here.
The Wichita Business Journal reported in July that LodgeWorks' local employment would be halved as some of the company's operations merged into Chicago-based Hyatt.
Cheryl Gilliam, LodgeWorks' vice president for brands and marketing, says the deal's revision will have little effect on what has already been announced for Wichita.
The major change, she says, is that four LodgeWorks hotels in Washington state, Pennsylvania and Virginia will continue to be owned by LodgeWorks but franchised from Hyatt.
"It simply means that we have additional hotels that we will continue to manage the assets of," Gilliam says.
Hyatt is expected to close on the asset purchase of the remaining 20 hotels on Aug. 31.
Gilliam says LodgeWorks doesn't have a firm picture of how many people will lose their jobs in Wichita or how many will move to Hyatt in Chicago.
Some of those jobs, she says, could be retained through December.
"We're still working through the transition," Gilliam says.
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