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InterContinental Hotel Group has seen revenue increased four per cent to $1.8 billion for 2017, primarily resulting from a four per cent increase in room numbers.
The hotel giant – which counts Crown Plaza, Holiday and Hotel Indigo among its current portfolio of 13 brands – had 798,000 rooms under management at the end of last year.
IHG saw 2.7 per cent growth in comparable revenue per available room for the year.
Over the year IHG added 83,000 rooms to its pipeline, representing its highest growth for nine years.
This included 37,000 additions in the Americas, with the remaining 46,000 split evenly between the Greater China and the soon to be combined EMEAA (Europe, Middle East, Asia and Africa) region.
Releasing the results earlier, Intercontinental Hotels Group also revealed it is to launch a new “upscale conversion brand” as well as acquire small luxury brands later this year.
The moves come to defend its position in the up-scale sector as others consolidate.
Wyndham recently acquired La Quinta, while Accor’s purchase of FRHI continues to pay dividends.
Keith Barr, chief executive of IHG, said: “In recent years, we have built a powerful and effective enterprise which has supported our transition to being fully asset light, and driven strong performance across our 5,300 hotels.
“Today we are announcing a series of new initiatives that build on our well-established strategy and will drive an acceleration in our growth rate.
“These initiatives are focused around redeploying and refocusing resources to leverage our scale; strengthening our loyalty programme; continuing to prioritise digital and technological innovation; enhancing our industry leading franchise proposition; strengthening our existing brands; and adding new brands where we see the greatest potential for growth.
“We moved at pace to develop and roll-out the concept for our new mainstream brand, avid hotels.
“Since September we have signed 75 hotels, with the first due to open later this year and a global launch being planned.
“Building on this successful approach, we will launch a new upscale conversion brand in 2018, leveraging the power of our system to capture share of this significant premium priced market.
“We will also build out our development resource and capability in the sizeable global luxury segment, where we are looking to acquire small luxury brand(s) to incubate and grow.”
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