Indian Hotels jumps 4 per cent! Heres why?

Indian Hotels announces Ahvaan 2025 to further accelerate profitable growth

India’s largest hospitality company The Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCL) has announced Ahvaan 2025. Under the plan, it will re-engineer its margins, re-imagine its brandscape and restructure its portfolio. IHCL aims to build a portfolio of 300 hotels, clock 33 per cent EBITDA margin with 35 per cent EBITDA share contribution from new businesses and management fees by FY 2025-26.

Ahvaan 2025 maps IHCL’s three-pronged strategy to grow profitably in the coming years. IHCL continues to re-engineer its margins with an emphasis on sustained revenue growth, cost optimisation and operational excellence. It will further strengthen the balance sheet with focus on free cash flows and be a zero net debt company.

Scaling its re-imagined brandscape, Ginger will be an important growth vehicle and will scale to 125 hotels, ‘amã Stays & Trails’, a branded offering in the homestay market will be a portfolio of 500 and Qmin, IHCL’s culinary and home delivery platform will expand to 25 plus cities.

IHCL also aims at re-structuring its portfolio and achieve a 50:50 mix between its owned/leased and managed hotels. It will look to stimulate growth by unlocking capital through strategic partnerships, monetization and simplification. Having signed the highest number of new hotels in India over two consecutive years 2020 and 2021, IHCL has a strong pipeline of 60 hotels. IHCL is present in 100 destinations across India. Taj, the iconic luxury brand is slated to grow to 100 hotels across the globe, while Vivanta and SeleQtions will scale to a portfolio of 75 hotels.

To quote Puneet Chhatwal, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of IHCL from a press release filed with the exchange, “Continuing its growth momentum, IHCL signed over 100 hotels and opened over 40 hotels in the past five years, making it the fastest growing hospitality company in India. Ahvaan 2025 will further accelerate IHCL’s profitable growth by scaling its diversified brand portfolio across its traditional and new businesses. Its iconic and strongest brand Taj, Paathya an industry leading ESG+ framework and a strong focus on digital will be the key enablers on this journey.”

Over the last 1 year, shares of IHCL have surged 83.70 per cent. Year to date the stock has furnished returns of 25.43 per cent.

On Monday, scrip of IHCL closed at Rs 231.15 per share on BSE recording gains of 3.63 per cent.