The Hindu Business Line : Pride Hotels expanding overseas

Taking pride
Talks on to buy out a 140-room property in London
The company is eyeing service apartments in Dubai.
Agencies appointed for feasibility study

Shubhra Tandon

Mumbai, Aug. 21 Pride Hotels, a Mumbai-based luxury hotel chain, is looking to expand its footprint in the overseas market. The group is looking at Dubai and London as possible destinations for the foray.

The Chairman of Pride Hotels, Mr S.P. Jain, told Business Line that negotiations are on to buy out a 140-room property in London. In Dubai, he said, the company is eyeing service apartments on a management contract basis.

“We have appointed agencies to do the feasibility study of the two properties and the report should be with us in two months. Both will be luxury business accommodations,” said Mr Jain, refusing to divulge further details.

Pride currently operates nine hotels of which six are owned properties and three are under marketing and management contracts. The company plans to invest Rs 500 crore by 2011 taking its room inventory to 1,500 rooms in 30 hotels from the current total of 800 rooms. Pride Hotels has a presence in Nagpur, Ahmedabad, Pune and Chennai.

Under its managed hotels called ‘Biznotels’, the company has a presence in Hyderabad, Chandigarh, and Kochi. It has also tied-up for managing an up market resort in Mahabaleshwar and a hotel and a spa in Jaipur. Its five-star property in Mumbai and a resort and spa at Alibaug and Goa will be operational by 2010.

As regards funding, the Rs 100-crore group plans to arrange funds through internal accruals, bank finance and Initial Public Offering (IPO). “Most of the investment will come from within the company while some finance has been approved from ICICI Bank, Citibank and Kotak Mahindra,” he said.

Commenting on the delay in its IPO, Mr Jain said that it had to be postponed due to “unfavourable market conditions” and would be out sometime next year. The company has received clearance for thi IPO from SEBI last year. Pride plans to raise about Rs 200 crore.

Other than expanding its hotel network, Pride has also set up a hospitality institute called Pride Institute of Hospitality & Business Management in Pune. The hospitality group plans to start similar ventures in Ahmedabad and Nagpur by next year. The institute offers courses starting from a six-month diploma to a three-year course in hospitality services. It will also be commencing a two-year full-time MBA course in marketing and finance from next year, he said.

Recently, Pride tied up with World Hotels which would give it the benefits of this Europe-based group’s extensive marketing reach and central reservations system across the globe.

World Hotels is a global group for individual, independent hotels and regional hotel brands. It offers business and leisure travellers choice of about 500 individual accommodation options in more than 300 destinations.

More Stories on : Overseas Investments | Hotels

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