Centara Hotels & Resorts is working towards being the top 100 hotels in the world, in terms of the number of operating rooms, and it plans to do so by securing more management contracts over the next five years.
“To do this, we probably need another 5,000 to 6,000 rooms. A quarter of this anticipated growth is going to be owned, while the rest are managed. With our own real estate, we also want to double the revenue within the next five years,” Michael Henssler, chief operations officer of Centara Hotels & Resorts, told TTG Asia at ITB Berlin 2024.
As Centara owns about one-third of its portfolio, Henssler said the company has empathy for fellow owners, and this is an advantage when it bids for management contracts.
At the moment, out of Centara’s 52 properties, around 20 are owned, while the rest are management contracts.
Henssler noted that resources for expansion are not a problem for the hospitality group, as it is backed by Thai multinational conglomerate Central Group.
“While Centara is renowned in Thailand, the perception of the brand outside of the country is not where it deserves to be, and this is our largest challenge. As a management company, we have an awful lot to offer, but property owners don’t know about it,” Henssler opined.
As to where future properties might be, Henssler pointed to home turf opportunities with Centara’s other hotel brands, such as COSI Hotels by Centara in a fourth-tier Thai city.
Vietnam, Laos, Indonesia, and Malaysia, as well as China, the Middle East, and North Africa are also destinations the groups wants to thrive in.
Henssler is also exploring popular resort destinations like Indonesia’s Bali, and Lombok, and Malaysia’s Kota Kinabalu, stating that Centara has “a lot of credibility in resorts”.
Overall, Henssler is optimistic about Asia’s travel sector, stating that it has rebounded strongly, and that the region is still value for money and safe.
However, he posited: “At the moment, growth rates in Asia are phenomenal, but I’m unsure of how long it can be sustained in this global climate. The only certain thing is uncertainty, so let’s stay vigilant, let’s stay creative, and let’s be humble.”
