AccorHotels eyes 55% increase in room-keys with more global luxury brands

French hospitality major AccorHotels is looking at expanding its portfolio and presence in India by increasing its rooms by over 55 per cent to touch 14,000 in the near term besides focussing on bringing major global luxury brands like Banyan Tree into this country.

Currently, AccorHotels has 9,000 room-keys across nine different brands majorly focused on the mid-executive segment. Its brands in India include Ibis – a mid scale brand which has been the growth driver in India.

Under the Ibis brand, AccorHotels currently has 19 hotels across 13 cities with over 3,000 rooms.

Out of 25 properties in the pipeline, six hotels will be under Ibis while another eight properties will be under upscale brands. InterGlobe Hotels - a joint venture between Indigo Airlines, owner InterGlobe Enterprises and AccorHotels – drives the Ibis business. After investing around Rs 2,000 crore since the past 14 years, when this joint-venture came into being, it will be investing another Rs 1,000 crore on this brand. InterGlobe Hotels also has some properties under the mid-scale Novotel brand.

“Our focus will increase tremendously on the luxury-premium space in the coming days. We have signed a deal for a 700-key hotel under the Fairmont brand in Mumbai and some property developers have contacted us for Banyan Tree brand”, Jean-Michel Cassé, chief operating officer of India & South Asia at AccorHotels told Business Standard.

Following an asset lite model, AccorHotels focusses on management contract rather than own and develop the property itself.

It has already introduced the upscale Raffles brand in Udaipur and Cassé would like to expand this brand to Jaipur, Delhi and Mumbai. For Banyan Tree, which is a resort brand, AccorHotels is on the lookout for a suitable deal in Goa and Coorg besides other leisure locations.

Currently, the company operates four luxury hotel brands - Sofitel, Fairmont, Pullman and Swissotel across Mumbai, Jaipur, New Delhi and Kolkata.

In 2015, AccorHotels signed an agreement with the Qatar Investment Authority, Kingdom Holding Company of Saudi Arabia and Oxford Properties for the acquisition of FRHI Holdings Ltd - parent of Fairmont, Raffles, and Swissotel brands which brought these brands to its kitty and opened up the luxury space for this French hotelier. The following year, Banyan Tree Holdings signed a partnership deal with AccorHotels to collaborate to develop and manage Banyan Tree branded hotels across the globe. 

Registering a 14 per cent growth in its revenues last year, the hotelier company wants to sustain the revenue growth even as it expands its presence from the current 50 hotels to 75.

Cassé is also looking at an opportunity for service apartments in Gurgaon.

“It will be a 160-room service apartment which we have targeted. However, after Gurgaon, we wont be looking at other locations on this”, Cassé said.

Under the present business model, its service apartments typically comprise of 50-rooms which are embedded in a 350-room Novotel hotel.

The upcoming service apartment may be under the Novotel Suites brand-name.