Fortune Hotels, a member of ITC’s hotel group, will likely be opening five new hotels with 375 rooms in India by the end of next year as a part of its healthy expansion plans in the country.
The firm has 38 working hotels with around 2900 rooms across 34 cities in the country.
“Apart from opening five hotels with over 375 rooms across four cities of India from our active pipeline by the end of December 2022, we are also in advanced negotiations for a few more projects, some of which are anticipated to open before the end of next year,” Fortune Park Hotels MD Samir MC told PTI.
These five new hotels will be — Fortune Resort Benaulim Goa, Fortune Park in Hoshiarpur (Punjab), Fortune Park in Tirupur (Tamil Nadu), Fortune Select in Goa and a Fortune Inn in Haldwani (Uttarakhand), he mentioned.
When questioned about the corporate model the company follows, Samir said, “While our primary model is currently on managed hotels, we continue evaluating different operating models including franchise model.”
He said about the corporation’s subsections; Fortune Park Hotels was set up in 1995 to cater to the mid-market to an upscale market segment in industry and leisure landing-place.
It has clearly explained sub-brands — Fortune Select, Fortune Park, Fortune Inn and Fortune Resort — below which the chain operates the resorts.
“Our portfolio mix comprises 30 percent hotels in the leisure space, and the rest are business hotels or mixed-use. With domestic tourism opening up and the world looking to find unique ways to holiday, our focus on leisure has grown. Most of our future expansion is set around pilgrim and tourist locations, and we see a big opportunity in this space,” Samir added.
When asked about the company’s expansion within the nation, “We have great confidence in the India growth story and know that the opportunity lies in tier II and III markets of India. We are currently exploring many new alliances with hotel investors in these markets and are hopeful to close more such alliances in the near future,” he further added.
With the signing of these five new agreements in the hospitality sector, Fortune Hotels has added 300 new rooms across four Indian cities, taking forward their actual inventory to around 3700 rooms across 42 cities.
It is also to be noted that ITC stock price has moved significantly higher, hitting a 52-week high on Thursday.
