Nigeria’s Transcorp Hotels Returns to Profit and Plans Expansion

Nigeria’s Transcorp Hotels, one of Nigeria’s biggest hotel players, reported that it had returned to profit in 2022 after a rough pandemic.

The company reported a full-year 2022 profit before tax of $9.8 million (4.5 billion Nigerian naira) on $68.2 million (31.4 billion naira) in revenue.

“This impressive achievement is the highest revenue generated since the inception of the company,” said Dupe Olusola, CEO and managing director. “The full-fledged return of the international business travel segment and the bolstering leisure segment contributed immensely to this performance.”   

The company doubled its net profit margin year over year from 7 percent in 2021 to 14 percent in the year 2022. It reported a $5.6 million (2.6 billion naira) profit after tax.  

But the operator and the owner of landmark properties Transcorp Hilton Abuja and Transcorp Hotels Calabar still has potential room to grow for profitability. Its profit after tax in 2022 was the same as it was in 2015, a year when the country endured a six-week closure of its major airport.

Transcorp Hotels is a hotel operator that’s a three-decade-old subsidiary of the conglomerate Transnational Corporation of Nigeria, with interests in energy and agriculture.

The Transcorp Hilton Abuja will add a state-of-the-art convention center this year, after having just added a premium spa. A luxury hotel in central Lagos is also in development. 

Since 2021, the company has been attempting an expansion into Airbnb-like travel categories by running a listing marketplace for vacation rentals and experiences. Transcorp Hotels, runs Aura, a mobile booking app and website that lets entrepreneurs list short-term rentals, tours, activities, and restaurants, as Skift has profiled before.

For a profile earlier this month on CEO Olussola, read Nigeria’s Independent.