Hilton, Bvlgari eye Oberoi’s Worli hotel

Several luxury hotel brands are vying for brand and management contract for Oberoi Realty’s upcoming hotel project in upscale Worli in Mumbai.

Hilton’s Waldorf Astoria, Marriott’s Bvlgari and Armani Hotels are understood to be in talks for the hotel, which is  currently at a construction stage, an industry source said. 

Names of  brands such as Mandarin Oriental and St Regis were doing rounds last year.

“Talks are now on with a new set of luxury brands, but the asset owner has not signed with anyone as yet,” an industry source told DNA Money.

A memorandum of understanding was earlier signed with Mandarin Oriental, “but I think the talks have broken off,” he said.

A senior Oberoi Realty official had said last week that the company was in discussions with international luxury brands, but did not share any names.

A questionnaire emailed to the hotel operators Hilton and Marriott, and Oberoi Realty remained unanswered at the time of going to print.

The Dr Annie Besant Road, Worli, project has been planned as  a 3.1 million square feet  multi-use development (hotel, commercial and branded serviced residences).

Oberoi Realty was targeting `8,000 crore revenues from the project, a senior company official had said.

The realtor has been trying to finalise hotel-cum-branded residence operator for a while now.
Expected to be a 25-year contract, as per the earlier plan, both the hotel (200 -225 guest rooms) and the branded residence (about 200 apartments) offerings were to be operated and marketed by the same operator.

Industry experts said the residential segment sales that were scheduled for June 2011 have been delayed by over a year now.

The realtor has hired South Korean construction major Samsung Engineering & Construction for this project.

Samsung E&C was also the lead contractor for the world’s tallest tower, Burj Khalifa, in Dubai, which opened in 2010 and houses the Armani Hotel.