Luxury Resort Owner Takes Going Green To The Extreme

After spending 17 years going from one hotel conference to another, meeting developers and signing management agreements, entrepreneur Sonu Shivdasani realized that he was getting burned out building his privately owned Bangkok-based Six Senses Resorts & Spas. "My sole goal was the next property would be as good as the last," says Shivdasani, 53. Thus, he decided to sell almost all of the five-star chain, comprising its own eponymous resorts, the Evason, to a U.S. private equity firm in 2012.

Soneva Jani aerial view.

He kept ownership of the flagship Soneva boutique and decided to focus his energies on a single brand, which now operates two resorts in the Maldives, one in Thailand, a yacht based in the Maldives, and a possible site under survey in the south of Japan. The first of which, Soneva Fushi, opened in 1995.
The privately-held company takes in about $70 million in revenue, with a healthy $24 million in profit, according to Shivdasani. He is backed by Chinese private equity firm Sailing Capital--a seven year fund which plans are to list Soneva on the UK stock market by 2021. "The idea of being both the owner and operator of our hotels, that allows us to have a very clear philosophy and strong brand DNA," says Shivdasani. "Soneva is built on the foundation that a business must exist for a greater purpose than shareholder returns" reads the resorts' website.

Sonu Shivdasani, Founder, CEO, and joint creative director of Soneva Resorts.

Among its initiatives, the resorts recycle plastic and glass, create their cooking charcoal, limit waste, grow its own produce-fed compost from hotel waste, installs solar panels to save fossil fuel use, and audit its supply chain for its environmental impact. The resort publishes an annual sustainability report. "We've never seen sustainability as a differentiator, we see it as a basic qualifier," says the hotelier who carries a thick brown leather-bound Filofax. The goal is to cut all fossil fuel use at the resorts by 2021. Soneva also has a 2% carbon levy to all visitors to offset both direct and indirect CO2 emissions across its operations, including carbon created by visitors using air travel to reach the resorts.

The funds raised from the carbon tax levy goes into various projects from building wind turbines in India, planting trees in northern Thailand, funding fuel-efficient cook stoves to war-torn Darfur and rural Myanmar, to providing safe drinking water to hundreds of thousands. The list goes on. Roughly $8 million worth of social projects have been funded since the levy was imposed.

Four bedroom water reserve exterior.

Shivdasani comes from a privileged background. He is the son of late Indoo Shivdasani, a businessman and philanthropist with extensive investments in Nigeria. Originally from India, the family moved to London in the 1940s. Indoo amassed a large fortune from his trading company, and investing in the eurodollar market. Sonu had an English upper crust education of Eton, Le Rosey in Switzerland and Oxford for college. His Swedish wife Eva is a former model, and the brand Soneva is a combination of their two first names.
While working for the family business, the scion saw an opportunity in the growing luxury travel market. After a few failed attempts at bidding for land in the Maldives, he had the opportunity to lease the deserted island of Kunfunadhoo from the Maldivian government. At the time, foreign ownership was prohibited by individuals, but sanctioned under hospitality groups. That law has since been relaxed to welcome accredited investors to certain reclaimed territory.
In addition to hotel accommodation, Soneva offers a villa ownership program with 25 properties sold-to-date."Fifty-two percent of our business is return," he claims, "that's why we've been successful in the sale of private residences."

Soneva Fushi Maldives.

Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/pamelaambler/2018/07/10/luxury-resort-owner-takes-going-green-to-the-extreme/#7aeb1fe6647b