Owners on investing in hospitality industry

The hospitality market in India is witnessing growth due to the country's diversity and rich culture attracting global guests and the recently held G20 Summit has given it a boost. The hospitality industry in India is estimated at $23.50 billion in 2023 and is expected to reach $29.61 billion by 2028, growing at a CAGR of 4.73 per cent during the forecast period (2023-2028) as per a report by Mordor Intelligence.

In a session on 'Unveiling the Future: Hospitality Assets in India – Strategies for Innovation and Success' at the 7th BW Hotelier Indian Hospitality Summit and Awards 2023, experts from the industry talked on how to understand the hospitality assets in India better.

The session started with an interesting rapid fire round. Later, the speakers elaborated on how they look at businesses going forward and everyone agreed on expanding it. On growing businesses, when asked Greenfield or ready asset, panellists had a mix reaction. Some went with Greenfields, others with ready assets and some with a mix of both.

The moderator for the panel discussion was Sanjay Sethi, CEO and Managing Director, Chalet Hotels. Eminent speakers who joined the session are Rahul Chaudhary, MD & CEO, CG Corp Global and CG Hospitality Holdings; JB Singh, President and CEO, InterGlobe Hotels; Ratan Kant Sharma, CMD, Triton Hotels and Resorts and Atul Dangayach, Managing Director, Dangayach Group.

CG Corp Global and CG Hospitality Holdings have a large presence globally and in India too and across industries and businesses. When asked as what in terms of strategy now going forward, what is the intent, how do they see panning out and how will they leverage the current market situation for this, Chaudhary said, "We like risk. We like to enter opportunities at a distress and where we see a huge upsize, we obviously like to work towards turning around those opportunities and getting the benefit of the upside in future."

It is a very VUCA environment for the last four years and things are looking up. On how they are addressing the agility and the adaptive part of strategies to prepare and grow for leapfrog into the next level for their company, JB Singh, President and CEO, InterGlobe Hotels, shared, "For us to be future ready is a continuous mind-set and it’s even more amplified when you operate in a country like India which is also emerging and consolidating."

Dangayach Group has varied brands in their current totals and the pipelines that they are working with and some of them are luxury brands. On how they see partnering with them at a global nature, driving company's business to profitability, Atul Dangayach highlighted, "Today, the world is more brand aware than ever. From the clothes we wear, the cars we drive, consumers are looking for branding and I think these brands bring instant global recognition and strong reputation with them. So as long we customise those offerings to Indian customers, it is a win-win situation."

On growth plans and how they see the brand engagement happening with their hotels, Ratan Kant Sharma, CMD, Triton Hotels & Resorts, shared, "All brands have increased their standards, so it was a good strategy for us to do that and then we went on adding more and more hotels in the same location but in segment where we don't have a competition."