Gateway Hotels & Resorts, which belongs to Taj group of hotels and operates in the upscale segment, opened Gateway Hotel IT Expressway, a 200-room property in Chennai on Saturday, its first there and third in Tamil Nadu. With this, GHR's room inventory stands at about 2,200 rooms.
The total investment in the Chennai project is about Rs 150 crore and is in management contract mode with LBR Hotels and Hospitality. The property is expected to break-even in about a year.
Launching its first hotel in Chennai on the OMR (Old Mahabalipuram Road), its 24th property in the country, Prabhat Verma, Chief Operating Officer, said: “In the first phase, we hope to add eight to ten hotels in the next 18 months.” All of them will be through management contract.
Positioned as an upscale hotel brand, Gateway targets smart travellers in the age group of 25-40, who travel a lot and works odd hours, he said.
The 200-room hotel will cater to both leisure and business travellers, said Ranjit Shankar, General Manager of the hotel. The gym will be open round-the-clock and one can have lunch any time.
The hotel, promoted by London-based NRIs and designed by the Singapore-based Sim Boon Yang, has a pool, spa, 4,800 sq. ft. ballroom and three food and beverages outlets.
Apart from the Gateway, the OMR has other business class hotels – Aloft, a Starwood brand , Fortune, part of ITC Hotels, Sabari Classic and Kohinoor Asiana .
According to industry sources, all these hotels are reporting 50-60 per cent occupancy during weekdays and almost half of that during weekends. And, most of them are through corporate contracts.
“Even for us, 60-65 per cent of our occupancy comes from our corporate clientele across the country,” says Deepa Misra Harris, Senior Vice-President, Global Sales & Marketing, The Indian Hotels Company Ltd (owner of the Taj group of hotels).
The sharp fall in rupee against the US dollar since May this year augurs well for inbound tourism to India during the tourist season beginning October, but tourist-friendly infrastructure needed to be paid attention to, according to Verma.
“ A weak rupee will make inbound tourist’s cost of travel in India much cheaper. Any foreign currency (in this case, rupee), which is weaker vis-à-vis the currency of one’s destination is good for the international traveller.” However, he said that India needs to work more on making itself an attractive destination for foreign travellers and scale up tourist-friendly infrastructure.
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