The Regional Secretary for Finance, Planning, and Public Administration, Duarte Freitas, attended the inauguration of the new Double Tree by Hilton Hotel in Lagoa, S. Miguel, on Wednesday evening.
“Having a Hilton hotel in the Azores means that the region is part of an immense distribution network, with an offer for different types of market, which boosts the exposure and notoriety of the Azores among high value-added target audiences,” he said.
This new hotel on the island of São Miguel has around 200 beds and has provided the opportunity to create new jobs, business development, and local economic value.
With an investment of more than 21 million euros, the new hotel received support from the Azorean government under the incentive systems and the CONTRATAR hiring support measure.
The Hilton Group is in more than 120 countries, with more than 7,500 accommodation units and 24 differentiated brands and experiences worldwide.
Duarte Freitas points out that, in 2023, the Azores had its best year ever, with more than 3.8 million overnight stays and record hotel revenue of around 158 million euros.
For Duarte Freitas, “these are increases of 14.4% in overnight stays and 23% in hotel revenue compared to 2022”, and, compared to 2019, there is an increase of almost 30% in overnight stays and more than 50% in revenue.

Lagoa steps up the promotion of the Azores.

The Mayor of Lagoa, Cristina Calisto, attended the opening ceremony of the Double Tree By Hilton Lagoa Azores hotel. It was an “important” day for Lagoa, which now has the American chain’s first hotel in the region and the most recent 5-star hotel investment on the island of S. Miguel.
Cristina Calisto congratulated the Hilton investors “for the trust they have placed in this young city and for the same trust established with the Lagoa City Council throughout this journey, which has allowed us to be here today to officially open the doors of this hotel.”
It should be noted that the Hilton has more than 100 rooms and around 199 beds and offers its customers a restaurant, a signature bar, a rooftop terrace bar, an indoor pool and an outdoor pool, a gym, and a spa.


For Cristina Calisto, “the presence of the Hilton in Lagoa represents much more than a hotel. It represents an increase in value and a new level of promotion for the Azores,” believing that the Hilton will generate wealth, not just for Lagoa, but for the Azores, and that, likewise, this hotel will not just promote the city of Lagoa, but the whole region.
It should be noted that the Hilton is a benchmark in the international market. It also provides the ecosystem consolidated in the Tecnoparque area with an essential support structure for developing its activities.
In this context, the mayor said that “the Hilton should be an added source of responsibility for all those involved in tourism in the region, including the Lagoa Town Council and the Regional Government,” mainly because this hotel is “a window of opportunity that we must be able to take advantage of to ensure that the Azores experience is a positive one.”
This hotel represents an investment of around 16 million euros, and it is believed that all the conditions are in place for the success of Hilton’s relationship with the Azores.
“I believe that this inauguration clearly reflects the importance of the municipality’s investment in this new area of economic development, the Tecnoparque. Science, research and innovation, as well as health and tourism, make this new area of the city of Lagoa an area of great potential for the present and for the future,” said Cristina Calisto, adding that in the 200,000 m2 area that represents the Tecnoparque and where this hotel is located, there are around 900 new jobs, most of them highly qualified, and almost 100 new companies, including those that are already working and those that will soon be starting up. This only confirms and validates the municipality’s commitment to the Tecnoparque project and to “Lagoa Investe” (a program to support economic initiatives of municipal interest), whose main objectives are to invest in the sustained development of the municipality to diversify the local business fabric; to invest in innovative areas and to strengthen and expand the municipality’s business fabric.
Cristina Calisto concluded her speech at the opening ceremony of the Hilton hotel by saying that “for all of this, and certainly for much more to come over the next few years, all the work and even all the challenges that this process has represented over time have been worth it.”

in Correio dos Açores-Natalino Viveiros, director

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publication and ADMA (Azores-Diaspora Media Alliance) at California State University, Fresno.