Swissôtel signs First Hotel in India

Swissôtel has signed a 10-year management contract with Bengal Ambuja Housing Development Limited Pvt. Ltd. (BAHDL), part of the Ambuja Realty Group in India, for a Swissôtel in Kolkata. The hotel is scheduled to open early 2010.

The upcoming five-star deluxe hotel will be part of Kolkata’s second City Centre shopping mall in the new and developing city district of Rajarhat (New Town). It is also conveniently located just three kilometres away from Netaji Subash Chandra Bose International Airport, the only international airport in the region. In recent years, Rajarhat has become home to numerous large IT and commercial companies such as IBM, Philips, Wipro and Tata.

This latest addition to the Swissôtel family will house 147 rooms, each at least 32 square metres in size, and three restaurants (including one specialty and one open-air restaurant), a lobby bar and a poolside bar. Other facilities include conference rooms with 1,261 square metres of meeting and banquet space, a fitness centre and a rooftop swimming pool.

“India is the world’s second-largest nation; the numbers are on a gigantic scale,” said Meinhard Huck, President Swissôtel Hotels & Resorts. “India is set to become the world’s third-largest economy by 2020. Consumer demand is growing steadily, particularly in the cities, and the middle class, which is also growing rapidly, has ever increasing consumption needs. Against this background, we see great potential for our hotel chain and are delighted to have found in BAHDL a well-known partner that appreciates our Swiss values.”

Formerly known as Calcutta, Kolkata is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. With a population of 6 million and a further 14 million people living in the suburbs, Kolkata is one of India’s five largest metropolises alongside New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore. It is also the main business, commercial and financial hub of eastern India and the northeastern states. The largest growth sectors in Kolkata lie in areas like hardware and software manufacturing, call centres, publishing and healthcare that prospered as a result of outsourcing, particularly by US companies. Calcutta Stock Exchange, the country’s second-largest stock exchange, is also based in Kolkata.

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