Gabriel Escarrer Julià (14 February 1935 – 26 November 2024) was a Spanish

billionaire A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least 1,000,000,000, one billion units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. It is a sub-category of the concept of the ultr ...

businessman, and the founder of

Meliá Hotels International Meliá Hotels International, S.A. (formerly Sol Meliá) is a Spanish hotel chain. Sol was founded by Gabriel Escarrer Juliá in 1956 in Palma de Mallorca and Meliá was founded by José Meliá Sinisterra (1911–1999). It is also known as and ...

. Gabriel Escarrer Julià was born on 14 February 1935 in

Porreres Porreres () is a municipality on Mallorca, one of the Balearic Islands, Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, sou ...

Mallorca Mallorca, or Majorca, is the largest of the Balearic Islands, which are part of Spain, and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, seventh largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. The capital of the island, Palma, Majorca, Palma, i ...

. He was the founder and chairman of

. In September 2024, he was awarded the Premio Empresario del Año (Entrepreneur of the Year) in the

Premios Vanguardia ' (; , ) is a Spanish daily newspaper founded in 1881. It is printed in Spanish and, since 3 May 2011, also in Catalan. It has its headquarters in Barcelona and is Catalonia's leading newspaper. Despite being mostly distributed in Catalonia, ...

. He had six children, and lived in

, Spain. Escarrer died on 26 November 2024, at the age of 89, in

Palma de Mallorca Palma (, ; ), also known as Palma de Mallorca (officially between 1983 and 1988, 2006–2008, and 2012–2016), is the capital and largest city of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of the Balearic Islands in Spain. It is ...

. His son Gabriel Escarrer Jaume is the chairman and CEO of Meliá.

References

1935 births 2024 deaths 20th-century Spanish businesspeople 21st-century Spanish businesspeople Spanish billionaires People from Mallorca {{Spain-business-bio-stub