Plans to launch four properties in India
Kahini Chakraborty – Mumbai
UK-based Premier Inn is going to open four hotels in India by 2016-17, as part of its larger expansion focus plans for the three regions- India, South East Asia and GCC markets. By the first quarter of 2015, the company will be opening two properties in Chennai (total of 171 rooms) and a 130 room inventory Goa property. The 350 rooms Premier Inn Mumbai Worli property is scheduled to open in 2018, which is under management contract and is developed by the Kamala Group. The properties scheduled to open in Goa and one Chennai are owned by Premier Inn, while the second property in Chennai and first one in Mumbai is through management contracts. Apart from these projects, the group is also eyeing other cities in India like Hyderabad, Lucknow, Ahmedabad and Dwarka.
Presently Premier Inn operates the following hotels in India; Premier Inn Bangalore Whitefield; Premier Inn New Delhi Shalimar Bagh; and Premier Inn Pune Kharadi. The group plans to have around 50 hotels in India, Southeast Asia and Middle East by 2018. Premier Inn currently operates over 670 hotels globally including five hotels in the Middle East and three in India.
Speaking to Food & Hospitality World, David Vely, senior vice president development, Middle East, Africa and South Asia, Premier Inn said, “We have aggressive pan India expansion plans. We are looking at penetrating into micro markets of Tier I, Tier II and III cities. To develop greenfield projects for our expansion we will look at selected investment of own capital or adopt the third party management contract model. We will build substantial scale in three regions – India, South East Asia and GCC markets via ‘asset right’ business model, building on UK’s brand strength to deliver the core elements of Premier Inn.” He further added, “Our international objective is to reach 5661 rooms by 2016-17 through 31 properties in eight countries. These are supported by an internal business plan.”
The expansion plans will see the group managing around 10,000 new rooms by 2018 in the GCC countries, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Middle East across key cities including Mumbai, Chennai, Goa (India), Bali, Bogor, Jakarta, Makassar, Surabaya and Yogjakarta (Indonesia), Bangkok (Thailand), Dubai and Sharjah (UAE) , Muscat (Oman), Doha (Qatar) and Jeddah (Saudi Arabia).