Jul. 9, 2007 (China Knowledge) – U.S. private equity investment firm Carlyle Group looks set to take up the opening of a strategic investor position offered by Kaiyuan Group, a Mainland hotel management company.

The U.S. buyout firm plans to pump less than US$100 million of investment funds into Kaiyuan, according to sources cited by the South China Morning Post. However, assistant to Kaiyuan president Chen Miaolin said he was unaware of such a deal whilst Carlyle declined to comment. 

Chen told Hangzhou's Youth Times that Kaiyuan Group was seeking out a company to take on a 40% stake in the company by means of an investment of as much as RMB1 billion.

In addition, Chen said that Kaiyuan intends to expand its operations by opening five hotels annually over the next five years, bringing the total number of hotels under its belt to 30 by 2010.

Though most of the hotels under Kaiyuan's umbrella are owned by the hotel company, it is mulling over plans to broaden its franchise business, reported the Post.

Hotel operators and mangers have proved to hot items up for grabs amongst global private equity firms, with the Hilton Hotels Corp <HLT> US$20 million buyout by Blackstone Group<BX> topping the list hitherto.