The Hindu Business Line : Indian Hotels Q4 net up 14.6 pc

THE INDIAN Hotels Company Ltd (IHCL) on Monday reported a 14.59 per cent rise in profit after tax (PAT) for the quarter ended March 31, 2005 to Rs 42.18 crore from Rs 36.81 crore for the year-ago period.

Total income was up 21.86 per cent at Rs 269.82 crore (Rs 221.41 crore ), including sales and other operating income at Rs 266.33 crore (Rs 212.28 crore).

For FY05, the company registered a 74.54 per cent growth in PAT to Rs 105.86 crore (Rs 60.65 crore) on a 25.87 per cent increase in total income to Rs 873.24 crore (Rs 693.76 crore). From IHCL's $150 million-foreign currency convertible bond issue of last year, $56.9 million had been converted into equity shares or was in the process of conversion. The board has recommended a dividend of 100 per cent (80 per cent). "The results reflect the buoyancy of the portfolio," Mr Anil P. Goel, Senior Vice-President (Finance), said at an analysts' meet attended by Mr Raymond Bickson, Managing Director, and Mr Ajoy Mishra, Senior Vice-President (Sales & Marketing).

IHCL has reduced its dependency on contracted room rates at city hotels, shifting chunks of corporate clientele to a new pricing policy. "The trend to watch out for in the hotel industry is dynamic pricing done on a daily basis based on demand forecasting," Mr Mishra said. While the shift is less for leisure hotels, there too a drift to dynamic pricing occurs in tune with the maturing of a destination.

However, he believed, the concept of apex fares, popular with airlines and now followed by another chain at the company's Goa property may not work. "It is more of an airline phenomenon. But it is a classic debate in the industry," he said. Notwithstanding the surge in room supply in Bangalore and to a lesser extent in Hyderabad, Chennai, Central Mumbai, Gurgaon and Goa, supply would continue be tight in the long run.

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