InterContinental checks into Chennai with Crowne Plaza

Global hospitality major InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) has set its foot here with its upscale brand Crowne Plaza signing up with Adyar Gate Hotels Ltd, a senior official said.

"We found IHG like us, hungry for business and our interests matched. IHG is strong in room reservations and has over 4,800 hotels under its fold. It has a young and energetic team. There were lot of synergies and hence the partnership," Manav Goyal, owner, director at Adyar Gate Hotels Ltd, told IANS.

The two parties signed the agreements a couple of days back.

Adyar Gate Hotels owns properties in and near Chennai and Ooty in Tamil Nadu and Vizag in Andhra Pradesh with total room strength of 566. It is coming up with a 60-room hotel at Kodaikanal, Tamil Nadu.

According to Goyal, the 288-room five-star hotel property (formerly Sheraton Park Hotel and Towers) will now be called Crowne Plaza Chennai Adyar Park.

Goyal said the hotel all these year majorly got its clients from Americas and Europe where IHG has a large presence.

He expects the tie up would boost the room occupancy levels at the property which is currently at around 53 percent levels.

"Our restaurants and banquets are doing well. It is only the room occupancy that needs to go up," he said.

A major portion of the property was recently modernised at a sizeable outlay.

"We have the option having the InterContinental brand once the renovation of the other part gets over," Goyal replied.

While Goyal is silent on the reasons ITC checking out of the property after 30 years of relationship, industry officials say the divorce might have come out owing to conflict of interest.

ITC has built its own over 600-room hotel ITC Grand Chola here and is competing against Sheraton Park Hotel and Towers.