Newstrack

Berggruen Hotels to unlock 'Keys' in Maldives

Dinkar Farwaha - New Delhi

Berggruen Holdings owned Berggruen Hotels is set to venture into Maldives and is on the verge of completing acquisition of two plots of land in the country. "We hope to complete land acquisitions by December 2008," disclosed Sanjay Sethi, its MD and CEO. While one of the properties will be under its Keys brand, the other will be developed under its yet to be launched upscale brand. The company expects the properties to be operational within two years.

Meanwhile, in the domestic market, the company has signed agreements to manage four properties. This would take its tally of properties to be managed in the domestic market to six. It had already signed management agreements in Mahabaleshwar and in Jaipur with Major Exports for its upcoming 120-room hotel.

As far as the ownership model is concerned, the company had already announced acquisitions in Bengaluru (Hosur Road and Whitefield), Thiruvananthapuram, Ludhiana, Kochi, Kovalam, Pune, Nasik, Pondicherry, Aurangabad, Vadodara, Jammu, Kolkata, Lucknow, Baroda and Raipur for its Keys brand and in Goa for its upscale brand. The group is also expected to complete acquisitions in Hyderabad and Mumbai (Andheri -West) over the next few months, where it plans to develop its upscale brand of hotels. It is also looking at Greater Noida, Chennai and Kolkata for the same.