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Indian Hotels' aggressive plans

By Ramnath Subbu

MUMBAI NOV. 8. The upturn in the economy and attendant pick-up in business travel have meant more business for the hotel industry. In this environment, Indian Hotels Company (IHCL), owners of the Taj brand of Hotels, has drawn up aggressive plans for growing its Business Hotels division.

Taj Business Hotels now number 18 in India and five overseas and the company foresees taking this number in India to 30 over the next five years. Speaking to The Hindu, Jyoti Narang, chief operating officer (COO), Taj Business Hotels, said, "We can grow through new properties and sweating existing assets or there can be a quantum change that will get more business from competition and get more than proportionate business from it".

"There has been a huge economic upturn and our experience shows that the hotel industry has become almost cyclical. We are at the beginning of a new cycle which will hopefully last three to four years," said Ms. Narang.

In metros, business hotels are at a price point lower than luxury hotels. Other than Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata and Hyderabad, Taj luxury hotels are in no other city and all hotels except those in resort towns are business hotels. Taj has a business hotel in Dubai, two in Colombo, one in Lusaka and one in Yemen.

"With the accelerated expected entry of the international chains, there was a need to protect the dominant position of the Taj Group in India," said Ms. Narang. The division will be offering a new range of facilities and upgrades. It was decided to benchmark with hotels and convention centres internationally. In order to provide peace and quiet, pre-function areas have been extended to include space for buffet meals and tea/coffee.

The first set of hotel rooms with the new features come with the opening of 40 rooms at Taj Residency, Bangalore, on December 1.

This would be followed by the opening of 65 rooms at Taj Connemara on January 1, 2004 and extended to the Taj President in summer of 2004. The Business Hotels division has only three hotels in IHCL — Connemara in Chennai, Residency in Aurangabad and Residency in Calicut. The rest are all tied up with different partners such as PIEM, Oriental Hotels, GVK Reddy and Taj Asia.

In terms of expansion, Taj Residency in Chandigarh is scheduled to open in Diwali 2004 and a business hotel in Technology Park, Bangalore, is scheduled for Diwali, 2005.

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