Global Hotel Chains on the Way to India

August 17, 2007	(2 votes, average: 1 out of 5)  Loading ...
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Increasing tourism in India has made a dozen global hotel chains bullish on to expand their horizons in the country. Putting it altogether, they have plans to set up over 350 five star hotels, four star and budget hotels and 50 villas.

If plans turn green, they would translate 65,000 additional rooms. The total number of hotel rooms in all categories has only grown by 10%, accounting for around 92,000 rooms.

India has been gaining high popularity on the global tourism circuit for the past couple of years. It would further be cleared in light of the data which says the foreign tourist arrivals in India have reached to 4.43 million in 2006 from 3.92 million in 2005. Foreign business travelers make a high percentage of the total inbound travel.

Besides, India sees around 300 million domestic travelers each year and the number is likely to soar by 10-15% every year.

The global hoteliers with plans to set hotels in India are making joint ventures with prominent realty companies. The renowned Hilton Group has joined hands with Indian real estate giant DLF to develop 25,000 hotel rooms within the next five years.

DLF will invest a whopping Rs 12,000 crore in the project to build a chain of hotels, including around 10-12 premier five star hotels and 100 business hotels in tier-II cities.

Accor, a pioneering hotel group in Europe, will introduce the Formule 1 budget hotels in India and set up hotels with the capacity of 5,000 rooms over five years. The company has also signed a deal with Mumbai based Nirman Lifestyle to build 5 hotels with 1080 rooms. The rooms will carry its different hotel brands.

Although, a number of announcements have been made in the past few months, but nothing much seem to have moved from statements to construction. The increase in interest rates has cut the pace of the construction, thereby affecting the overall supply of hotel rooms in India.

News Published Under:   Hotel Industry in India |