KEY POINTS:
Neville Mahon, whose Auckland company is developing two large projects in Fiji, is expanding into Australia.
Mahon, director of Greenlane-based Lausanne Project Management, says he is developing a large coastal resort project between Coffs Harbour and Port Macquarie in New South Wales.
He is planning to have 18 residences built on a 50ha site he has owned for 14 years. The land is bounded by a reserve, and Mahon said it had taken some years to get planning permission for the project.
His main focus since 1996 has been Fiji, where he has development work worth about $600 million in the pipeline: the $300 million Hilton project, where work has started on the second stage, and the $300 million Nananu-i-Ra Island to the north of Viti Levu, Fiji's main island where Nadi and Suva are located.
Mahon said he kept a low public profile because he wanted to keep his life simple and did not need or want publicity about any of his projects.
"I don't want to be a flash Harry," he said.
But he is one of Fiji's largest New Zealand-based developers and investors, building many villas and resort rooms in the last decade.
On Denarau Island, linked to Viti Levu by a causeway, he is developing the second stage of the Fiji Beach Resort & Spa managed by Hilton.
The project is expected to be worth around $300 million when it is finished. The hotel's top luxury villa has its own pool and costs $5000 a night. Guests pay $2500 a night for a nearby three-bedroom villa.
Egyptian Mahmoud Mokhtar is the Hilton resort's general manager. He has worked for the hotel group since 1996 when he was appointed executive assistant manager for the Hilton Fayrouz Resort at Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt. He was involved in opening three other Hiltons in Egypt. He arrived in Fiji in March 2005 and says he has watched the transformation of the resort from bare land.
Rupert Hallam, born in Britain, is the Fijian Hilton's business development director and has been at the resort since January last year.
The Hilton in Fiji is about a 20-minute drive from Nadi.
Denarau Island is popular with international resort operators and already has a group of luxury hotels, including the Sheraton and Westin. The island is also popular among tourists because of its proximity to the area's main marina, which allows easy access to the outer-lying Mamanuca and Yasawa Islands.
Properties at the Hilton resort are selling for $460,000 to $4 million and Mahon is using money from pre-sale purchase agreements as well as funding from Strategic Finance in Auckland to fund the Hilton development.
The hotel's first stage of 240 rooms and 150 villas is open but Mahon said the resort could not be called Hilton Fiji until he expanded it further and provided facilities which the Hilton considered crucial before it allowed its name to be used.
"We need to open a ballroom and meeting rooms and a spa and it will be called Hilton Fiji later next year," he said.
Stage two will bring an extra 91 villas and 146 rooms.
Lausanne is marketing 79 freehold sections on Nananu Island, where Mahon is also planning a 30-room hotel, village, marina, clubhouse and dive resort.
The military coup in December initially caused problems for the business, Mahon said, when sales inquiries slowed for sections on his island and villas and rooms at the Hilton.
Investors were concerned about Fiji's future but the situation for many New Zealand developers worsened when Fiji's Land Transfer Office stopped transferring land.
Mahon said the political regime was now perceived to be stable and he was receiving strong sales inquiries.
He said the biggest obstacle to development he had faced last year was the lack of skilled labour and a scarcity of building materials because so much work was going on in Fiji.
"This year both these issues have gone away because other development projects have not proceeded, so therefore we've been inundated with subcontractors and suppliers, all dropping their prices.
"Prices overall have come back 30 per cent for labour and materials," Mahon said.
Bookings at the Hilton were also strong, he said. By late March more than 3000 room nights - accounting for 54 per cent of the resort - had been booked for April, Mahon said.
Wet weather has caused him problems this year. Work on Nananu Island ground to a halt due to an excessively wet summer, Mahon said.
"There hadn't been much rain for three years but there was seven weeks of rain after we started the earthworks there," he said. Machinery has been on the site but largely unable to work since Christmas.
As for his company's name - Lausanne - Mahon said it had no significance or connection with Fiji and was merely a shelf company picked up via his lawyer and business associate Gregory Shanahan, who is also chairman of the St Patrick's Cathedral Heritage Foundation.
Projects by Neville Mahon
* Completing Fiji Beach Resort & Spa managed by Hilton on Denarau Island, Fiji.
* Developing 79 villa sites and other amenities on Nananu Island, Fiji.
* Developing 18 luxury villas on an Australian coastal site.
