Straits Trading to refurbish its hotel assets

MAINBOARD-LISTED Straits Trading will be pumping in more than $190 million to refurbish its hotel assets, as part of plans to strengthen its hospitality business.

The company is also reorganising its hospitality assets under one unit as it embarks on ambitious plans to expand in the Asia-Pacific region.

Straits Trading, which owns the Rendezvous Hotel in Bras Basah Road, announced yesterday that it will set up a wholly owned subsidiary called Rendezvous Hospitality Group, or RHG.

RHG will hold all the company’s hospitality assets and its hospitality management arm Rendezvous Hotels and Resorts International, giving it an asset base of more than $300 million.

The RHG portfolio includes 13 hotels under management – some are owned and others leased – and four additional properties under development.

Straits Trading has two brands.

The first, Rendezvous, is for hotels rated four to five stars and located in the city area.

The other, The Marque, is a boutique brand, with some hotels outside the city centre.

Straits Trading intends to reposition these hotels as business hotels, with plans to roll out some of these changes over the next few months.

Most of the $190 million will go towards upgrading the properties to meet these new standards, it said yesterday.

Heading RHG will be business veteran Iqbal Jumabhoy, who joined the company earlier this year.

The Jumabhoy family started the Ascott serviced apartments in Scotts Road.

Straits Trading said that it will target expansion in Australia, New Zealand, South-east Asia, India and the Middle East.

Mr Jumabhoy said: ‘Currently, there are very few players who both own and manage hotel assets and who are based in Asia. We intend to firmly establish ourselves as the regional leader by growing to over 12,000 rooms in the region by 2020.’

RHG currently has about 2,600 hotel rooms.

Straits Trading chairman Chew Gek Khim said that the launch of RHG signified a new direction for the diversified group, with strategic business units being engines of growth.

Source: Straits Times, 22 Oct 2009