Top official of Oakwood sees bright future for hotel industry in Vizag

Visakhapatnam: Oakwood, which specialises in promoting new brands of luxury and comfort internationally, sees a huge potential for luxury hotels in Visakhapatnam, the largest city in Andhra Pradesh with several large industries located in the vicinity.

Company's Director (Operations) in India Hoshang Garivala told Bizz Buzz in an exclusive interview here on Friday that they would love to take up projects in Visakhapatnam which has all the ingredients to become a fabulous holiday destination and a topclass industrial city.

He said if properly developed, the city would witness a dramatic increase in the number of tourists from across the country and abroad. He said the city had better potential than Goa due to manfinificent beachfront area, archaeologically significant sites, Araku valley and INS Kursura Submarine Museum and other attractive locations.

"The city at present has hotels with 2100 to 2500 rooms. There is potential to increase it further," he said. To a question, he said they had held negotiations to take up one or two properties in Visakhapatnam before COVID-19 pandemic. Now with the situation improving, they would revive their efforts, he stated.

Garivala said being the leading service apartment brand with headquarters in the USA and Asian headquarters in Singapore, they have high interest in Hyderabad. "We are already operating two properties in Bangalore, one in Pune and another in Hyderabad. Five more are in the pipeline out of which two are located at LB Nagar and Shamshabad and LoI will be signed for another property in Hyderabad shortly." One property in Goa and another in Bangalore will come up soon. The first among the five in the pipeline, will be ready in two years and the last by the end of 2024.