Korea's No. 1 hotels and resorts company, now running Bali.

SONO Hotels & Resorts is the hospitality business of SONO International, the largest hotels and resorts company in South Korea. It operates around 15,000 rooms across 43 locations in seven countries — Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, Japan, the United States and France — and is part of SONO TRINITY GROUP, which also owns golf courses, water parks, an entertainment business and a Korean airline.

Yes. Flight Centre Travel Group sold Cross Hotels & Resorts to SONO International in November 2025. Cross kept its Bangkok headquarters and its team, and the Asia business now trades as SONO Hotels & Resorts Asia.

This is why both names appear in ELLE material. Geonet signed the management agreement with Cross in September 2025; two months later Cross became part of SONO. The contract, the team and the pipeline did not change.

There are two honest answers. The group traces its founding to February 1979, when Daemyung Housing was established — that is the anniversary it celebrates. The hospitality business itself began in November 1987 with Daemyung Leisure Industry, and the first resort opened in 1990.

SONO International, the company Geonet contracts through, was established as a legal entity on 1 October 2005. The SONO name was adopted in 2019.

Around 15,000 rooms across 43 locations in seven countries, per SONO International’s June 2026 KOSPI listing application. In Korea alone it operates 22 properties and reports 12,609 rooms — the largest such portfolio in the country — plus 63 holes of golf, nine water parks, a ski resort, a marina and an equestrian club.

In South-East Asia it runs 16 lifestyle hotels with a further 12 properties signed and in development through 2029.

The group is Korean. Asia-Pacific is run from Bangkok — The Trendy Office Building, Sukhumvit 13 — by a ten-person leadership team, with a permanent Indonesia office in Legian, Bali.

That matters for ELLE: the decision-makers for the region sit four hours from the asset, and the country team lives in Bali.

SONO International reported revenue of ₩968.8 billion (approximately US$627 million) and operating profit of ₩248.2 billion (approximately US$160 million) for FY2025, an operating margin above 20%, disclosed in its preliminary KOSPI listing application filed on 27 June 2026 with Daishin Securities and Mirae Asset Securities as joint lead underwriters.

Because those figures come from a regulatory filing rather than marketing material, they are the most reliable indicator of the operator’s standing. The listing itself remains subject to regulatory approval and is not an investment opportunity offered here.

Six operating properties in Bali today — in Seminyak, Kuta, Legian, Nusa Dua and Ubud — plus Cross Celesta on Nusa Penida opening 2027. Five further Bali projects are signed: ELLE Resort & Beach Club, Geonet’s Berawa resort, SONO Felice Canggu, Cross Bali Waluya and Cross Bali Uluwatu, with three more in Batam.

Their Area Vice President for Indonesia has said publicly that Indonesia is the group’s most important growth market.

Ten brands. Six Korean resort brands built over three decades — SONO Felice, SOL BEACH, SONO Calm, SONO Belle, SONO Moon and THE SONO — and five South-East Asian lifestyle brands that came with Cross: Cross, Cross Vibe, Away, Lumen and Cross Collection.

ELLE Resort & Beach Club is contracted under Cross Collection, the group’s vehicle for independent hotels that keep their own distinct identity rather than being folded into a chain look.

Under a hotel management agreement the operator runs the hotel on the owner’s behalf: it recruits and employs the general manager and department heads, sets brand and service standards, prices the rooms, controls distribution, and reports performance to the owner.

SONO’s scope starts well before opening — feasibility and design review, project management review, procurement, systems selection, the manning guide and organisational chart, then pre-opening sales and marketing.

What an HMA means for your specific investment terms is a question for Geonet and the offer documents, not for the operator’s marketing. Ask for it in writing.

Depth in the exact market, and an operator you can reach. SONO has six operating hotels in Bali, a resident Indonesia office, and an Asia-Pacific leadership team in Bangkok rather than a regional desk inside a global chain. It brings 588,363 Korean loyalty members, 3.18 million app users and a group-owned airline pointed at the same region as the asset.

The two companies had also worked together before. ELLE is their second management agreement, signed seven months after the first.

Limited, and worth saying plainly. Cross Collection is the group’s established vehicle for independent, design-led hotels, and SONO contracts branded residences as one of its three standard commercial models — but there is no comparable fashion-brand resort already operating in the portfolio.

ELLE Resort & Beach Club is the flagship for this category within the group, which is part of why it was signed under Cross Collection rather than a chain brand.

Yes — twice. In February 2025 the two companies signed a management agreement for a 120-suite family resort in Berawa, Bali, opening 2028. In September 2025 they signed ELLE Resort & Beach Club by Cross Collection, 168 keys in Seminyak, also opening 2028. ELLE has since broken ground.

Operator continuity, change-of-control provisions and termination rights are set by the management agreement and the offer documents, not by this page. The 2025 change of ownership is a useful precedent: when Flight Centre sold Cross to SONO, the management agreements, the Bangkok team and the pipeline carried through.

For the specific protections attaching to your interest, request the term sheet and the Product Disclosure Statement and take independent advice.

This is the strongest part of the case. SONO reports 588,363 loyalty members and 3,184,167 online members in Korea — described by the group as Korea’s largest hospitality membership network — with over 10 million annual visitors across its properties and 1.1 million social followers.

The group also owns Korean carrier T’way Air, being rebranded Trinity Airways, and holds sales-agent partnerships in eleven countries including Australia, India, China, Japan and the United Kingdom. Its own phrase for the combination is "Sky. Stay. Play."

No figure here is a forecast of occupancy or returns for any individual property.

ELLE Resort & Beach Club is scheduled to open in 2028 and has broken ground, with Colliers International as project management partner.

Between now and opening the operator’s work is technical and commercial: design and planning review, project management review, procurement and brand standards, then pre-opening — recruiting the general manager and department heads, building the organisational chart, setting the rate matrix, establishing distribution and booking systems, and running pre-opening sales, PR and marketing.