Driven by the burgeoning Indian tourism sector, coordinated government campaigns to promote ‘Incredible India’, and the 2010 Commonwealth Games, Indian hospitality majors like the Indian Hotels Company (Taj hotels and Palaces), East India Hotels (Oberoi), The Leela group and Maurya Sheraton are leaving no stone unturned as they gear up to provide their guests a “personalised travel experience”.
Along with leading real estate developers, a few are understood to have even finalised new locations and are contemplating equipping these hotels with state-of-the-art technologies.
In July, 2008, the Taj group introduced a high-definition video-conferencing facility in collaboration with Tata Communications. The properties also feature Cisco TelePresence rooms. Taj has already introduced Wi-Fi, IP telephony, and radio frequency identification device (RFID).
Wi-Fi is just not restricted to the big players — many 3-4 star-rated hotels are also deploying Wi-Fi services.
Hyderabad-based Hotel Golkonda — a three-star hotel — has deployed full-fledged wireless local area network (LAN); Hotel Green Park in Hyderabad, Vishakapatnam and Chennai, has implemented a Wi-Fi internet system across its properties.
The hotels plan to go beyond just providing full tele/video conferencing facilities in coffee shops and business centres, Wi-Fi enabled rooms and lobby, internet facilities, etc., to adopting Unified Communications (UC) – a technological concept that helps devices locate and talk to each other.
Thanks to UC, voice over wireless LAN handsets could allow staff to respond quickly to guest requests from anywhere in the hotel. Besides, a colour touchscreen voice over internet protocol (VoIP) phone could greet guests as they enter their room.
The phone’s easy-to-use menu would put ‘Housekeeping’ a touch away. Each room’s mini-bar is connected to the VoIP network and programmed to report billing and re-stocking requirements.
Besides helping hotels handle more traffic during the games, UC solutions also help provide features like weather updates, city tour guides, navigation facilities and taxi-booking on multiple devices like PCs, laptops and mobiles.
Smart rooms are another feature which include functions such as key-less entry, rooms that can map customer preferences for room temperature, preferred room lighting, and food, TV/ video preferences.
A 2008 Frost & Sullivan report estimates that enterprise telephony solutions sales in the Asia Pacific (excluding Japan) travel and hospitality industry was around Rs 850 crore in 2007, and will grow at a CAGR of 9.4 per cent from 2008 to 2014.
Ritesh Jayswal, director – Industry Solutions, Avaya, explains: “Hotels are looking at enterprise communications as an investment (as opposed to costs) to generate revenue and also a competitive edge to give differentiated services.
The Ahmedabad and Jaipur blasts have forced hotels to review electronic surveillance systems too. Prakash Prabhu, country manager, Axis Communications India, says his company has been receiving enquiries from 5-star hotel chains that are revamping their infrastructure.
