909-key Midtown Manhattan landmark anchors a wide-ranging collaboration spanning hotel management, distribution, technology, and talent development between two of the world's leading hospitality and consumer platforms
NEW YORK and SEOUL, South Korea, June 1, 2026 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Lotte Hotels & Resorts, the global hospitality arm of South Korea's Lotte Corporation, and Highgate, the largest owner and operator of hotels in New York City and one of the world's leading hospitality investment and management platforms, today jointly announced a strategic partnership that will see Highgate assume management of the iconic Lotte New York Palace Hotel, the 909-room luxury hotel at 455 Madison Avenue. The Palace engagement, which takes effect in June 2026, anchors a broad collaboration between the two companies spanning hotel management, distribution, technology, and talent development across the Americas and Asia.
The Palace will continue to operate under the Lotte New York Palace flag, with Lotte retaining full ownership of the asset. Highgate will assume day-to-day operations, revenue management, sales, marketing, and labor relations functions effective June 2026, with on-property transition activity already underway.
A Landmark with More Than a Century of New York History
Few addresses in Manhattan carry the historical weight of the Palace. The property is anchored by the landmarked Villard Houses, the brownstone complex commissioned in 1882 by railroad financier Henry Villard and designed by McKim, Mead & White in the Italian Renaissance Revival style. The 55-story modern tower, opened in 1981 as New York City's first true modern luxury hotel, established the property as a leading destination for heads of state, business leaders, and cultural figures — a position it has held for more than four decades.
Lotte Hotels & Resorts acquired the hotel in 2015 — its first North American investment — and rebranded the property as Lotte New York Palace Hotel. More recently, Lotte purchased the underlying land from the Archdiocese of New York, consolidating fee ownership of one of the most prominent addresses in Midtown Manhattan and signaling its long-term commitment to the asset. The hotel sits directly across Madison Avenue from St. Patrick's Cathedral and steps from Rockefeller Center, and its Madison Avenue Courtyard and Gold Room remain among the most recognizable hotel interiors in the city.
Highgate's New York Footprint
Highgate is the largest hotel owner and operator in New York City, with a portfolio that spans full-service luxury, lifestyle, and select-service assets. Recent additions to Highgate's New York platform reflect both the firm's scale and the breadth of its operating capability across every tier of the market. Highgate has relaunched The Row Hotel on Eighth Avenue, acquired and now operates the InterContinental New York Times Square, partnered with the legendary Ian Schrager on the iconic Public Hotel, and taken over operations of the Courtyard Hotel on Third Avenue. Few hospitality companies operate at this combination of concentration, range, and brand sophistication in any single market in the world.
The addition of Lotte New York Palace Hotel gives Highgate one of the most significant single-asset luxury operating assignments in the city and deepens its leadership position in the Manhattan luxury and group-driven segments. The property's union workforce, scale, and meeting and event infrastructure align directly with Highgate's core operating expertise in the New York market.
Lotte Hotels & Resorts: A Global Hospitality Platform
Lotte Hotels & Resorts is one of Asia's most established luxury hospitality platforms with a portfolio of more than 40 hotels and resorts across Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Russia, Myanmar, Uzbekistan, and the United States. Founded in 1973 with the opening of Lotte Hotel Seoul, the company has built a multi-tier brand architecture spanning Signiel, its ultra-luxury flagship; Lotte Hotels, its full-service luxury collection; L7 by Lotte Hotels, its lifestyle brand; and Lotte City Hotels, serving the urban business traveler.
In the United States, Lotte operates four properties, two of which are in Manhattan: the Lotte New York Palace Hotel and The New Yorker Hotel by Lotte Hotels, an iconic art deco landmark near Penn Station already operated by Highgate. The Lotte U.S. portfolio also includes Lotte Hotel Seattle, a Philippe Starck-designed luxury hotel in downtown Seattle, and L7 Chicago by Lotte Hotels, the brand's first North American L7-branded property, located in the Loop steps from the Chicago Riverwalk.
Signiel Seoul, located in the landmark Lotte World Tower, is widely regarded as one of the leading luxury hotels in Asia, and Lotte Hotels & Resorts holds among the strongest commercial positions in the region with both inbound luxury travelers to Asia and outbound Korean and broader Asian guest flows worldwide. As the hospitality arm of Lotte Corporation, one of South Korea's largest conglomerates, with operations spanning retail, duty free, food and beverage, real estate, and financial services, Lotte Hotels & Resorts is uniquely positioned at the intersection of brand strength, capital scale, and consumer reach.
A Broader Strategic Partnership
The Palace engagement marks the start of a larger strategic partnership between the two organizations. Under the partnership framework, Lotte and Highgate intend to collaborate across multiple dimensions:
- Hotel collaboration across North America and Asia – The two firms will pursue joint operating opportunities across both regions, structured to leverage each company's native strengths in its home markets. In North America, Highgate will serve as a preferred operating partner for additional Lotte-affiliated hotel assets as the company continues its expansion across the United States, the Caribbean, and Latin America. In Asia, Highgate will partner with Lotte on opportunities where Highgate's lifestyle and luxury operating platforms and its principal investment capabilities can be deployed alongside Lotte's operating depth, regulatory fluency, and brand resonance across the region.
- Global distribution – The companies will collaborate on global distribution across direct channels, group and wholesale, loyalty, and third-party intermediaries, with the explicit goal of driving cross-market demand between Asian and Western source markets. The framework anticipates coordinated channeling of outbound Korean and broader Asian travel into Highgate's gateway portfolios across the Americas and Europe, and reciprocal direction of North American and European demand into Lotte's Asia-Pacific assets. Both firms believe this is a structurally underexploited opportunity in global hospitality and intend to address it together.
- Technology and AI in hospitality – Both firms have made hospitality technology a strategic priority, and the partnership establishes a structured framework to collaborate on the operating and guest-facing technology questions reshaping the industry. The companies will jointly develop and deploy next-generation revenue management and demand-forecasting systems, combining Highgate's analytics-driven commercial platform with Lotte's deep operating dataset across Asia's most sophisticated travel markets. They will collaborate on artificial intelligence applications across the back of house — including accounting and finance automation, predictive maintenance, energy management, and workforce optimization — and on guest-facing personalization, including unified guest-recognition and recommendation systems that operate seamlessly across both portfolios. The framework also contemplates joint evaluation of property management and digital guest-experience platforms, drawing on Korean leadership in consumer hospitality technology, and co-investment in hospitality technology ventures where the two firms' combined scale and operating insight can accelerate industry-wide adoption.
- Talent exchange and secondment – The two companies will establish a formal cross-training and secondment program, enabling executives and high-potential operators to rotate between Highgate and Lotte properties and corporate offices across markets. The program is designed to build operational fluency in both Western and Asian luxury service standards, deepen revenue management and commercial capability across both firms, and create the kind of personal relationships across teams that produce durable operating outcomes over time.
"Lotte is one of the great hospitality and consumer companies of our era, and the opportunity to build a long-term, multi-platform relationship with an organization of its caliber and ambition is rare," said Richard Russo, principal at Highgate. "What gives this relationship its foundation are the core tenants that both companies share: an entrepreneurial, principal-led culture; a willingness to invest deeply in our people, in our technology, and in our operating discipline; and a commitment to building for the long term. We are deeply grateful that Lotte has entrusted the Lotte New York Palace Hotel, one of its most important assets, to our care. That responsibility is not lost on us, and the Palace is only the beginning of this work. The broader collaboration across hotels, distribution, technology, and the wider business ecosystems both companies bring is where the long-term value for both Highgate and Lotte will be created. We approach this significant partnership with excitement and admiration."
Highgate will assume management of the Lotte Palace this month with implementation of the strategic initiatives beginning shortly thereafter.
About Highgate
Highgate is a leading global real estate investment and hospitality management company widely recognized as an innovator in the industry. Highgate is the largest owner and operator of hotels in New York City and the dominant player in major U.S. gateway cities including Boston, Miami, San Francisco and Honolulu, with a growing footprint in Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America. The hospitality forward company provides expert guidance through all stages of the property cycle, from planning and development through recapitalization or disposition. Highgate has a proven record of developing its diverse portfolio of bespoke lifestyle hotel brands, legacy brands, and independent hotels and resorts with contemporary programming and digital acumen. The company utilizes industry-leading revenue management tools that efficiently identify and predict evolving market dynamics to drive outperformance and maximize asset value. With an executive team consisting of some of the most experienced hotel management leaders, the company is a trusted partner for top ownership groups and major hotel brands. For more information, please visit www.highgate.com.
About Lotte Hotels & Resorts and the Lotte Group
Lotte Hotels & Resorts is one of the core companies of the Lotte Group, one of South Korea's largest conglomerates. Founded with the opening of Lotte Hotel Seoul in 1973, the company operates a global portfolio across Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Russia, Myanmar, Uzbekistan, and the United States under brands including Signiel, Lotte Hotels, L7 by Lotte Hotels, Lotte City Hotels, etc. Since its founding in 1967, Lotte Group has built a successful and diversified business portfolio spanning food & beverage, retail, hotels, chemicals, construction & infrastructure, and bio industries. The Group has also actively expanded into global markets and currently operates businesses in more than 30 countries across Asia, the Americas, and Europe. For more information, visit lottehotel.com.
Media Contact
Richard Russo, Highgate, 1 9176129004, [email protected], https://www.highgate.com/
SOURCE Highgate
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