Lotte Hands Luxury NYC Hotel to Highgate: ‘Framework’ for More

Lotte Hotels & Resorts spent over $1.3 billion assembling control of its Manhattan flagship, the 909-room Lotte New York Palace on Madison Avenue. This week, it hands the keys to someone else.

Highgate, the New York investment and management firm, will begin running the Palace “in the next few days,” according to Richard Russo, a principal at Highgate. Lotte will keep ownership of the asset and real estate.

The contract is the first piece of a broader framework that the firms described as potentially spanning hotels, distribution, technology, and staff training across the Americas and Asia.

“We’re looking at ways that we can bring our ‘special sauce,’ and they can bring theirs to drive incremental value at our respective hotels or potentially find new hotels to do together,” Russo said in an exclusive interview.

Of broader significance is what Lotte chose not to do. The Korean company runs its own luxury flags at home, from the ultra-luxu