lobal hospitality technology platform OYO has announced that it plans to double the number of premium hotels in India in 2023. It plans to support the surge in business travel by increasing its footprints across all the major business cities.
Its premium hotel brands include hotels such as Townhouse Oak, OYO Townhouse, Collection O and Capital O. OYO plans to add approximately 1800 premium hotels this year. OYO’s focus on premium hotels started in the last quarter of 2022 when it added more than 400 new premium hotels between October to December. OYO’s expansion will focus on key business cities such as Bangalore, Hyderabad and Chennai in South India, Delhi and NOIDA in North India, Kolkata in East India and Mumbai in West India.
The demand for premium segment hotels has picked up significantly in last few months. This could be attributed to the surge in domestic leisure travel, transient travel, pent-up demand from meetings, incentives and weddings segment, and gradual recovery in business travel and foreign tourist arrivals (FTAs).
A report by credit rating agency ICRA says that India’s hotel room supply pipeline is expected to grow at 5-year CAGR of 3.5-4% adding approximately 15,000 rooms to the pan India premium inventory of approximately 94,000 rooms in financial year 2023. As per the findings of the report, pan-India premium hotel occupancy is expected to be 68-70% for FY23. Service industry is anticipated to lead the demand for business travel in the first quarter of the year 2023.
Increase in air travel is also leading to higher demand for premium hotels. Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) shows that India’s domestic air traffic rose 95.72% year-on-year (YoY) to 125.42 lakh passengers in January this year as compared with 64.08 lakh passengers in the corresponding period last year.
