Business & Finance Club - Dubai: Austrian house builder Elk announced last week that it's entering a new business sector by offering prefabricated hotels which can be built in just eight weeks and can be set up anywhere in the world. Elk is partnering with Vienna-based interior design firm Derenko and has set up a new subsidiary called Fertighotel for the project.

The hotels are based on a modular concept and can be adapted to individual needs of a hotel operator, the company said.

"It fits on every land plot and can be arranged for any desired room size and room numbers," the company said in a release. "The modular hotels can be built and equipped for hotel categories of 1 to 4 stars."

According to Derenko's CEO Andreas Hiehs, the cost of building the prefabricated hotels is cheaper than usual for hotels in certain categories. For a three-star category hotel, costs per room range between 30,000 and 35,000 euros (Dh141,000 to Dh164,500). The cost per room in a prefabricated hotel would be only 28,000 euros (Dh131,000), Hiehs said.

The company is offering to plan the entire prefabricated hotel, as well as act as general contractor. It will also arrange financing. The hotels are manufactured in factories in Europe and can be quickly assembled at the construction site. A fixed completion date is guaranteed, Hiehs said.

The framework of the hotels is standardised, but a choice of covering is available.

They can be given diverse styles, like wooden coating, a glass facade or different designs made of plaster.

Elk and Derenko plan to export their concept. The Elk group, which has headquarters in Schrems, Austria, is the European market leader in off-site manufactured constructions, with more than 70,000 constructed units. It has 1.630 employees in five factories in Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic. Elk also has licensees in 12 countries, among them France, Italy, Spain, Russia and Cyprus.

However, the concept is not entirely new.

Other companies like Netherlands-based Tempohousing are offering modular housing and prefabricated hotels based on standard container-sized construction elements.

Building expenses

• 28,000 cost in euros per room in a prefabricated hotel
• 30,000 starting cost in euros of a room in a 3-star hotel