Hotel chain Scandic has signed an agreement to build a new hotel in Haugesund, Norway with work expected to start this summer and due for completion in autumn 2009.

This is the fourth Scandic hotel project recently announced in Norway, along with a property at Gardermoen Airport and another two in Bodo and Stavanger.

The hotel in Haugesund will be built for NOK200m (£20m) and will feature meeting facilities for up to 320 delegates as well as a restaurant and bar.

“Haugesund is an exiting town, with plenty of activity in the offshore and shipping industries, and of course deriving from the gas processing plant on Karsto,” said Scandic president and CEO Frank Fiskers. “The town is busy and important destination for many of Scandic’s key customers, so it makes strategic sense for us to be able to offer central meeting facilities of a high standard.

“Finally we [will] have a hotel in Haugesund to increase Scandic’s presence in the oil-producing region of Western Norway, adding to the hotels we already have in Bergen and Stavanger.”

The chain has 19 hotels operating or under development in Norway.