Rotana hotel group to open branches in Iran

Rotana Hotel Management, the Dubai-based hospitality group plans to open hotels in Iran.

Omer Kaddouri, president and CEO of Rotana said that the company will open a hotel in Iran’s eastern city of Mashhad next year.

He made the remarks addressing the International Travel and Hospitality Conference in Iran’s central city of Isfahan Feb. 20, Trend correspondent reported from the event venue.

Kaddouri further said that the company has plans for three more hotels in Iran by 2018, one more in Mashhad and two in Tehran.

The four hotels will have 840 rooms in total, He noted. “We will be bringing our brand Rayhaan to Iran, but we are also looking into bringing Arjaan hotel apartments, which are much demanded,” Kaddouri added.

Rotana hosts six million guests and provides food and beverage services to nine million people per year in 33 hotels throughout the Middle East, he said, adding the company will open a global sales office in Tehran in the present year.

Commenting on reasons why Iran is ripe for hotelling business, he said “We witnessed a 12-percent rise in visitors even before sanctions were lifted.

What rise will come later will be much greater.” Kaddouri added that Iran hosted 4.8 million foreign tourists in 2014. He went on to say Iran has a wide range of attractions, including 19 UNESCO-registered sites, mountain ranges, carpet and other handicraft, religious and corporate government tourism programs, and an active exhibition business.

But, Kaddouri said, Tehran has only 96 hotels, and when compared to 627 in Dubai or 2,380 in London, it’s nothing.

He also noted that Iran aims to attract 20 million tourists per year by 2025. Rotana is a hotel management company in the Middle East, Africa, South Asia and Eastern Europe region, which has a portfolio of over 100 properties in 26 cities and operates five sub brands which include Rotana Hotels & Resorts, Centro Hotels, Rayhaan Hotels & Resorts, Arjaan Hotel Apartments and The Residences.

Local news agency Mehr earlier reported that Iran has 1,100 hotels – 130 of them have four and five stars. Iran plans to triple the number of hotels in the country before 2025. Experts believe that by 2025, the number of the tourists arriving in Iran will increase from five million to 20 million.

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