The second session of the Alumni Breakfast Club took place on 23 March in the Aula Jardín of the Barcelona Campus. The meeting was organised by the management of Alumni & Careers and Corporate Development Department and some 40 former students participated in the event that centred on investment in the post-covid tourism sector. The speaker for the session was Alejandro Hernández-Puértolas, ADE Class of 1993 and Founding Partner & CEO of HIP (Hotel Investment Partners), the largest hotel group in southern Europe (Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece).
In his presentation, Hernández-Puértolas analysed the current tourism sector, which has been badly affected by the pandemic. Even so, he was optimistic throughout his presentation and despite the fact that “the current hotel business in Spain is changing” he assured the audience that the sector would improve in the future. “I have a positive view of the sector and its investments. Southern Europe is the largest tourist market in the world and the macro-trend is very clear. (...) The leisure industry is not at risk because hotels will always be needed for holidays” he added. Likewise, business tourism (MICE), which has also been affected by the pandemic and teleworking, will bounce back. According to this UIC Barcelona alumnus, company managers need to meet with their employees in-person for training sessions and company culture meetings. Some values cannot be transmitted through a video call.
The CEO of HIP also spoke about investment and business, which are very relevant to the sector and are currently in a constant state of transformation. “Everything is changing, the world is changing, and brands and experience are becoming increasingly important,” he said. Taking the case of Barcelona, Hernández-Puértolas explained that the city is mainly seen as a tourist destination, and that makes it less interesting than Madrid in terms of investment by companies and big investors. Always optimistic, he assured: “I have no doubt that Barcelona will once again be booming. (...) We have sun, sea and a very well-developed infrastructure, just as the rest of southern Europe has.”
Another aspect discussed was Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) criteria. He said that energy expenditure currently accounts for 2% of the sector's costs. After staff, this is the highest cost in the sector and is an asset that needs to be examined: “There is a lot of work to do here. We have machinery that needs to be modernised to be more efficient and more sustainable.” On this issue, Hernández-Puértolas was in favour of moratoriums that stop the building of new hotels, since “the impact on the territory is enormous.”
The second session of the Alumni Breakfast Club ended with many questions from an engaged audience. Rector Alfonso Méndiz then made a speech thanking the attendees. As all were UIC Barcelona alumni, he referred to them as “the past, present and future of the university”.
Alumni Breakfast Club meetings are especially aimed at students that graduated from bachelor’s, master's, or INEDE in the early years of the university, and have been designed as a space for dialogue on topical issues through talks by experts and leading professionals from different sectors. The first session was on palliative care and coincided with the opening of the Cuidas clinic, the University Clinic for Support in Advanced Diseases and Palliative Care.
