Starwood Hotels thinking to launch St Regis & W Hotels in India
The world famous hospitality player Starwood Hotels & Resorts is planning to launch its luxury brands St Regis and W Hotels in India to meet the demand of the Indian market. With the launch of this brand in India, Starwood will have eight out of its nine brands in India.
Mr. Dilip Puri, managing director India and regional vice president, South Asia, Starwood Asia Pacific Hotels & Resorts, says that they are also planning to launch their luxury brands St Regis and W Hotels to India soon with one St Regis and four W Hotels currently under construction.
The company currently operates 38 properties with total room count of over 8,500 keys. The company also has 6000 more room under its pipe line with a total of 35 hotels under development. The company also thinks that Indian market will become the 3rd largest market in next few years.
He further added that India is Starwood’s fourth largest market and will soon be the third. They have strong foot prints and many projects to implement. Currently, they operate 38 hotels in India and have 35 under development.
The group currently runs 10 luxury collection hotels, four Sheraton brand hotels, six properties under the Westins brand, seven under the brand Le Meridien, six under the Four Points by Sheraton and five under its Aloft brand of hotels.
He further added that they are on the track to achieve their target of 100 hotels operating by the end of 2015.
He also pointed that Starwood is also focused on its portfolio of Le Meridien with renovated hotels and new resort hotels under construction. Le Meridien Mahabaleshwar will open in 2014 and Le Meridien Jaipur, Kochi and Bangalore are at various phase of development. They also have Le Meridien Hotels under development in Noida and in Ahmedabad. They are growing in NCR and Sheraton hotels are also under construction in Chandigarh, Greater Noida and Whitefield in Bangalore. They have 5 Aloft Hotels currently operating in India and have three more under development – Aloft Bangalore Cessna Business Park will open this year and Aloft New Delhi Aerocity and Aloft Goa next year.
The slow speed of development of hotels and the slow speed of development of infrastructure is the major problems for the hotel industry.
Mr. Puri also added that Infrastructure, licensing, regulatory clearances, land acquisition slow down the growth of hotel development. Other challenges are access and connectivity that hotel industry faces.
To achieve its planned growth, the group is also expected to add more than 2,000 jobs over the next 2 years.
Source: mydigitalfc.com
Ahmedabad, Aloft Bangalore Cessna, Aloft Goa next, Bangalore, Bekal, Chandigarh, Chennai, Dilip Puri, Greater Noida, hotel, India, Jaipur, Khandala, Kochi, Le Meridien, Mahabaleshwa, NCR, New Delhi Aerocity, Noida, South Asia, St Regis, Starwood Hotels & Resorts, W Hotels, Whitefield
