Premier Inn India, an Indian subsidiary of UK’s budget lodging chain Whitbread Plc, which had two years ago entered into a Joint Venture (JV) agreement with Emaar MGF, has acquired the entire stake (50.1 per cent) of its partner. Premier Inn will develop new properties independently and continue to operate the existing hotel.
The JV was created in June 2007 to develop Premier Inn in the emerging Indian business hotel market. After two and a half years, Premier Inn has already opened its first hotel in Bengaluru and currently has two hotels under development in Delhi and Pune.
Aly Shariff, Managing Director, Premier Inn in India said that the company on its own will invest Rs 495 crore to develop nine hotels by 2013. These nine hotels will have 1,295 rooms. Its existing hotel in Bengaluru which opened in November 2009 has 105 rooms. “We want to be the number one hotel chain in our segment in India. For the foreseeable future, we would continue to develop the brand independently,” added Shariff. In the UK, Premier Inn has over 590 hotels with 40,000 rooms. |