Accor Hotels to add 20 hotels across India in next 3-5 years

Global hospitality major Accor Hotels plans to add 20 properties across India in the next three to five years as it adopts an asset-light strategy going forward and mulls bringing new brands to the country. The company currently has 51 hotels across nine brands with around 9,500 rooms in India.

"We have 20 hotels in that are in pipeline in India which will be operational in next three to five years," Accor Hotels Chief Operating Officer India and South Asia Jean-Michel Casse told PTI.

The new hotels will come up in places such as Mumbai, Bengaluru, Udaipur, Goa, Jaipur and Shillong among others, he added.

As the strategy of the company is to develop mid-scale and economy segment, the hotels will be mainly Novotel and Ibis and as well as few opportunities in the luxury space, Casse said.

Luxury space is also increasing in terms of signing products after the acquisition of Fairmont, Raffles and Swissotel a few years ago and the acquisition of Movenpick last year.

Accor has become the second largest operator in the luxury space globally which is giving the company more opportunity to bring these brands to India, he added.

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"In key cities, we are looking to grow our luxury network by growing brands such as Fairmont and Sofitel. We are also aiming to bring our ultra-luxury brands like Raffles to India and are also looking at luxury leisure with an aim to bring brands like Banyan Tree to India," Casse said.

When asked about the business model the company follows, Casse said: "We follow the asset-light model and we manage the hotels. Going forward it will be 100 per cent asset light."

About the segments, he said the largest segment in terms of volume is still corporate but segments like MICE are also increasingly becoming an important segment.

In India demand has always been strong, the supply has settled and so the company sees an opportunity for increasing the average room rate, he added.

Accor Hotels Group currently has 4,800 hotels in 100 countries.