InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), the world’s largest hotelier by number of rooms, has signed an agreement with Dubai-based developer Select Group to open the InterContinental Dubai Marina, the firm said Sunday.
The hotel, which will form part of the Bay Central development in the Marina, is scheduled to open at the end of 2013, the group said. The property will include 132-hotel rooms as well as 196-studio, one, two, three and four-bedroom residential apartments.
The UK-based hotelier in May said it planned to hire between 10,000 and 15,000 staff in the Middle East as it ramps up its expansion plans in the region.
The firm, which operates five brands – InterContinental, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express and Steybridge Suites – plans to open 40 new regional properties in the next three to five years, six of which will be in the UAE, said Pascal Gauvin, COO for IHG India, Middle East and Africa.
“We have 40 hotels in the pipeline in the Middle East and Africa. We have five openings this year still to come,” he told Arabian Business.
“How many people we recruit depends on the size of the hotel, but it could be 10,000 or 15,000 people.”
A new brand, Indigo, will be added to its regional offering in 2014 with the opening of the Hotel Indigo Riyadh in the Saudi capital’s King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD).
The five new properties to be opened this year will include Crowne Plaza properties in Doha, Jordan and Medinah, a Holiday Inn Express in Bahrain and a Holiday Inn in Riyadh.
Its Steybridge Suites hotel in Beirut is expected to open early next year, Gauvin said.
Other hotels in the pipeline include InterContinental Riyadh KAFD and the InterContinental in Kuwait.
IGH operates 170 hotels across more than 60 countries with an additional 58 hotels in the global development pipeline.
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