Executive Summary

Baseline Travel Ltd is a Malawi-based corporate travel management company, Destination Management Company (DMC), and licensed tour operator providing professional travel solutions across Malawi, Zambia, Tanzania, South Africa, and Botswana. We specialize in corporate travel management, meetings and events (MICE), tailor-made tours and safaris, accommodation bookings, airport transfers, vehicle hire, and destination management services. Through our regional expertise, trusted partner network, and commitment to service excellence, we deliver seamless, reliable, and customized travel experiences for corporate clients, government institutions, development partners, NGOs, and leisure travelers. Our mission is to simplify travel while showcasing the best of Southern Africa through exceptional service, innovation, and sustainable tourism practices. We seek US$1,000,000 for Malawi's Gateway Hotel & Conference Centre (28-30 keys). Investment via equity or preferred return. Funds cover construction, FF&E, and working capital over 24 months. Terms negotiable. Indicative only. Baseline Travel Ltd is led by a highly motivated management team with expertise in business leadership, travel management, operations, procurement, customer service, and strategic planning. Under the leadership of Founder and Managing Director Bright Msukwa, the team combines strong local destination knowledge with professional business practices to deliver reliable corporate travel solutions, destination management services, and exceptional travel experiences across Southern Africa. Supported by experienced travel coordinators, destination specialists, professional guides, drivers, and trusted regional partners, the team ensures seamless execution of corporate travel programmes, MICE events, safaris, and tailor-made journeys across Malawi, Zambia, Tanzania, South Africa, and Botswana. Through a commitment to innovation, operational excellence, and customer satisfaction, the Baseline Travel team continues to build a trusted African travel brand focused on quality service, strong partnerships, and sustainable growth Baseline Travel Ltd is a growing travel management company and Destination Management Company (DMC) with current annual revenues below USD 500,000. The company has demonstrated steady growth through corporate travel services, tour operations, strategic partnerships, and customized travel experiences across Southern Africa. With continued investment in marketing, technology, operational capacity, and regional partnerships, Baseline Travel is well positioned for future expansion, driven by increasing tourism demand, corporate travel opportunities, and the development of innovative travel products. The company’s long-term outlook remains positive, with a vision to scale operations, increase market reach, and become a leading travel management and DMC brand in Africa. Southern Africa's tourism and business-travel markets are entering a sustained growth phase, and Baseline Travel Ltd is positioned at the intersection of several converging trends. Globally, air passenger traffic is projected to exceed 4.7 billion journeys in 2026, feeding a global airport-hotel market forecast to grow from US$22.4 billion in 2025 to US$38.7 billion by 2034. Yet Lilongwe, Malawi's capital and primary gateway, has no purpose-built hospitality product serving this demand, with the city's largest existing conference venue offering under 2,400 square feet of event space across only ten hotels citywide. This supply-demand imbalance represents a clear and actionable opportunity for a carefully calibrated development that can capture both the transit and meetings segments simultaneously. At the same time, Malawi and its neighbouring markets, including Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Tanzania and South Africa, continue to attract growing interest from international tour operators seeking authentic, less-crowded alternatives to Africa's more saturated safari circuits. This demand shift is not speculative; it is already reflected in Baseline Travel's own pipeline, including its active group-safari programme with WeRoad Germany, which demonstrates the company's existing ability to originate and service international leisure traffic into the region. The broader regional tourism outlook is reinforced by infrastructure improvements, visa liberalisation efforts, and the steady recovery of long-haul travel from key source markets in Europe, North America, and Asia, all of which point toward sustained occupancy growth for well-positioned hospitality assets in emerging gateway cities. As an established destination management company already operating ground transport, accommodation sourcing, and corporate travel services across the region, Baseline Travel is not entering this market as a first-time operator but as a regional business extending into a hospitality gap it already sees daily through its existing client base. The company's day-to-day operations involve booking rooms for corporate clients, arranging transfers for international arrivals, and coordinating conference logistics for NGOs and government agencies; in doing so, it frequently encounters the limitations of Lilongwe's current stock of hotels, which are either too small, too dated, or too far from the airport to serve as credible venues for larger gatherings or convenient overnight stays. This operational insight gives Baseline Travel a distinct advantage over external developers who would need to conduct extensive market research to understand local demand patterns, pricing dynamics, and booking behaviours. The Gateway Hotel & Conference Centre is conceived as the direct response to this gap, positioning the company to capture demand across leisure safaris, corporate and NGO travel, government and regional conferences, and the broader airport-transit market in one integrated offering. By combining a modern, efficiently sized hotel with a flexible conference centre designed for events of up to 200 delegates, the project aims to become the default choice for business travellers, event organisers, and safari groups transiting through Lilongwe. The proximity to Kamuzu International Airport, coupled with the city's role as a diplomatic and humanitarian hub, ensures a diversified revenue base that is less susceptible to seasonal fluctuations than pure-play leisure properties. Moreover, Baseline Travel's existing relationships with regional suppliers, local contractors, and international tour operators will accelerate the ramp-up phase and reduce the typical friction costs associated with new market entrants, ultimately enhancing the risk-adjusted return profile for prospective investment partners.