OYO plans centre of excellence in Kolkata

Hospitality firm OYO Hotels and Rooms on Monday said it is planning a centre of excellence for training and capacity building in the city.

The company has also made an offer to the West Bengal government to maintain a realtime data repository for 'Digital Arrival and Departure Register'.

"We are looking to set up an OYO Centre of Excellence (OYO Skill Institute) towards the end of the year, as we continue to scale our business further in the state. The government has extended support with space," CEO, India and South Asia, Aditya Ghosh said here on the sidelines of CII Bengal Tourism Global Meet 2019.

The space for the training institute is likely to be in New Town area.

At present, OYO trains about 3,500 people per month from 26 institutes globally, company officials said.

It estimates a capacity of around 7,500 rooms in West Bengal.

OYO manages a total of 4.5 lakh rooms across the world, including 1.64 lakh rooms in India, they said.

About the digital data repository, Ghosh said it aims to provide realtime updates to state governments on arrivals and departures, making this a "more efficient and transparent" process as compared to the manual version.

"At this point, we have seen acceptance from the state governments of Haryana, Rajasthan and Telangana of our proposed digitisation of guess entry and departure records," an OYO official said.

West Bengal Tourism Minister Gautam Deb said the state was developing tourist areas and circuits, and is seeking private investments.

The state was also planning to come up with an app for tourists to give their feedback, besides other digital support.