IHG eyes deeper Adani partnership, more hotels at airports across India

New Delhi: IHG Hotels & Resorts that signed a five hotels deal with Adani Airport Holdings (AAHL) last month is keen to partner with the company to launch more hotels at airport and other commercial locations, said Sudeep Jain, MD of Southwest Asia at the chain.

AAHL and IHG Hotels & Resorts signed a managed hotel portfolio agreement last month to develop five hotels across ‘key’ airport-linked and ‘high-growth’ urban destinations in India. The portfolio is expected to add close to 1500 keys and includes a Kimpton hotel in Jaipur as well as Holiday Inn, and Holiday Inn Express hotels within upcoming hospitality -led mixed-use developments as part of the Adani airport cities. These hotels are planned across Navi Mumbai, Mangaluru, and Thiruvananthapuram.

“There is a massive alignment between their aspirations and ours for the long term. This is centred around growth ambitions and the reliance on the infrastructure growth in the country,” said Jain. “We are in talks to deepen the partnership. AAHL has got many airports and many more hotels to build at those airports and the existing ones. They have publicly said they want to do 60 hotels. We have signed five. Not all will come to us, but we are pretty certain we will do more together,” he added.


IHG has got a fair bit of exposure close to airports in locations such as Lucknow, Delhi, Mumbai. “When you land at Heathrow, you see IHG family hotels everywhere, and when you land in Singapore, you see the Crowne Plaza Changi,” said Jain.

"As more land parcels come around Jewar airport, and owners are interested, we would like to be in that consideration set. Given the breadth of our portfolio, we could also look at other tier two, tier three and tier four markets as long as there is demand,” he added.

Also read: Adani’s Navi Mumbai and Guwahati airports named among Prix Versailles’ World’s Most Beautiful Airports 2026

IHG Hotels & Resorts currently operates 52 hotels across six brands in India and has a pipeline of 98 additional hotels expected to open over the next three to five years.

Besides announcing the launch of the luxury lifestyle brand Kimpton brand through the AAHL deal, IHG is also bringing its Vignette Collection brand to India. “We are on the lookout for Regent, our ultra luxury, bespoke brand. The filter to bring a Regent will be higher but we are in talks for that,” he added.

Jain said the chain is heavily focused on the domestic business in India and has seen a double digit revenue per available room growth in the first five months of the year.

“Given the events of the last three or four days, I see that buoyancy will only increase. We have three years of record signings. We have got lofty targets and we are aiming for a record year,” he added.

There are three or four risks that could decelerate the growth the chain has seen in the past few years. "These are risks around regulatory frameworks, the availability of capital, talent shortage and the pace of infrastructure growth. Infrastructure growth is benefitting us right now, but it needs to be sustained," he added.