Whitbread will pay £44 million for the group, which manages four hotels in the UK.

The sale provides a return of three times its original investment for Graphite, which led the fundraising to establish the business in 2002. Golden Tulip’s turnover last year was £15.2 million.

Whitbread intends to rebrand the six Golden Tulip hotels (five of which have three stars, and one four stars) as Premier Travel Inns by the end of the year. Golden Tulip has plans for a further nine hotels within the next two years, which will bring the total number of rooms in the business to more than 2,000.

Golden Tulip chief executive Peter Roberts comments: ‘With Graphite’s support, we have created a portfolio of profitable hotels catering for the growing “value-for-money” conscious business and leisure traveller.

‘Whitbread’s considerable experience in this sector of the hotel market will ensure our business goes from strength to strength.’

Last week, Graphite Capital backed the acquisition by cylinder gas specialist Dominion Gas of rival business Global Gas Supplies. The deal, worth £22 million in total, followed Graphite’s support of Dominion’s management buy-out in June.