Boustead to manage Conlay Plaza Hotel in 2008

By Vasantha Ganesan
bt@nstp.com.my


July 10 2006


THE Boustead group will manage its third hotel — The Conlay Plaza Hotel located the Golden Triangle of Kuala Lumpur — in 2008.

The hotel to be a five-star hotel/service apartment, will be managed by Boustead Properties’s subsidiary Boustead Hotels & Resorts on behalf of the owner Irat Hotels & Resorts Sdn Bhd.

Irat Hotels & Resorts Sdn Bhd, a company 70 per cent owned by Lembaga Tabung Angkatan Tentera (LTAT) and 30 per cent by the Ministry of Finance, will build the 285-rooms and 109- service suits hotel located on Jalan Conlay, Kuala Lumpur.

“Boustead Hotels & Resorts will only manage the hotel and we do not intend to purchase the building,” Boustead Properties’ executive director Datuk Ghazali Mohd Ali told Business Times.

The Boustead Group is also controlled by the LTAT. The Boustead Group already owns and manages two four-star hotels — the Royale Bintang on Jalan Bukit Bintang and Royale Bintang in Damansara.

The cost of the new hotel, which includes a coffee house, a Malay restaurant and Italian cuisine, has not been confirmed.

However, Ghazali hopes that the hotel will fetch RM300 per room per night for a standard room.

Early this year, Ghazali told Business Times that the group may have at least five hotels under its wings by 2010, as it moves to tap further into the foreign and local tourist markets.

Following the success of the RM40 million 145-room Royale Bintang Damansara, Boustead is looking at the possibility of opening another hotel there.

At the same time, the group is keen on a second hotel opening in Bukit Bintang, which is expected to be an a 50:50 joint-venture basis and expected to start in 2007/2008. Ghazali also pointed out that hotel operations will be incidental to its development and is not expected to be a major part of the group’s business in the future.

Boustead's 2 new hotels to be operational by 2009

By Isabelle Francis


Boustead Holdings Bhd's hotel division Boustead Hotels & Resorts Sdn Bhd plans to have two new 300-room hotels -- one in Kuala Lumpur and another in Penang -- operational by 2009.

The Conlay Plaza -- a five-star mixed project includes a 300-room hotel and 100 serviced apartments -- along Jalan Conlay, Kuala Lumpur. The other is the four-star 300-room The Royale Bintang Penang.

Both hotels will come under Boustead Hotels & Resorts chain, says The Royale Bintang general manager Leo Kuscher.

Kusher was speaking after the official opening of The Royale Bintang's RM2 million Rimba Spa in Kuala Lumpur on Oct 6.

“The Conlay Plaza should come on line end of 2008 and the Royale Bintang Penang at the beginning of 2009,” Kuscher said.

The Rimba Spa is Jojoba International Sdn Bhd’s third outlet in the country with the other two in Berjaya Times Square and The Royale Bintang Mutiara Damansara in Petaling Jaya. The spa chain operator would open its fourth at The Palace of Golden Horses in Seri Kembangan by year-end.

Operations manager Vickie Pai said Jojoba International outlets in Malaysia received about 5,000 customers monthly, of whom 40% or 2,000 are foreign customers.

Anything going on here? :?

Boustead to manage 5-star hotel
By Vasantha Ganesan
bt@nstp.com.my

August 10 2007

http://www.btimes.com.my/Current_News/BT/Friday/Nation/ichulan.xml/Article/Current_News/BT/Images/btgraph2/kuscher.jpg

COME December 2008, the Boustead Group will manage its first five-star hotel - The Chulan Plaza Hotel in Kuala Lumpur - located on Jalan Conlay, adjacent to The Chulan Tower.

The hotel is being built at an estimated cost of RM157 million, by the Irat Hotels & Resorts Sdn Bhd, a company 70 per cent owned by Lembaga Tabung Angkatan Tentera and 30 per cent by the Ministry of Finance.

This is based on an average room cost of between RM300,000 and RM400,000 for the 392-unit hotel/serviced apartment.

Boustead, also a LTAT company, will manage the hotel, given its experience in owing and operating two very successful four-star hotels under the Royale Bintang banner.

"After Boustead's success with Royale Bintang Kuala Lumpur and Royale Bintang Damansara, we are optimistic that we can manage this five-star hotel," its general manager, Leo Kuscher, said.

"Our target date for the opening is December 2008. We want to open before Christmas next year," he said, adding that work has started on the basement level and ground floor.

The building, on 1.66 ha, includes a tower for the 104 units of serviced apartments and a six-storey building built around a courtyard which accommodates 288 rooms and a shopping arcade.

The building design is said to have authentic Malay influence and blends in with the design of The Chulan Tower.

"We hope to establish a landmark building because of its authentic Terengganu styled architecture. It will be a unique building and a must-see," Kuscher said.

He hopes the building's heritage appearance will help it double-up as a tourist attraction.

"It will be like The Raffles in Singapore or The Peninsula in Hong Kong," he said.

The Chulan Plaza's main target group for its hotel is the commercial and meeting, incentive, convention and exhibition crowd.

"The hotel will have a ballroom that can accommodate 1,000 people, six meeting rooms, and a covered courtyard for themed functions.

"About two-thirds of our guests will be business and the remaining leisure," Kuscher said.

The hotel hopes to fill up 60 per cent of its room inventory in the first year of operation and to collect an average room rate of RM300 a night. The serviced apartment targets to provide accommodation to the transient expatriate crowd.

There will be seven food and beverage outlets, including French and Malay restaurants at the hotel. Apart from the usual facilities like a gymnasium, swimming pool and a spa, the hotel will also have a kids club and shopping arcade.

^^
It is on one side a refreshing change to have a 5* hotel which looks different from the highrises. But I wonder if this concept will be a success.

previously it was an abandoned project rite??

^^
It is on one side a refreshing change to have a 5* hotel which looks different from the highrises. But I wonder if this concept will be a success.

Tanjong Jara Resort and Pangkor Laut are the examples of this concept...and i think those are successful...in fact, tourists want to have local culture...so, a malay-oriented style is a good thing....and of coz, different peoples different ways of hospitality they want...

yup..it was installed since the last project was a retail store project, not a hotel...

He hopes the building's heritage appearance will help it double-up as a tourist attraction.

"It will be like The Raffles in Singapore or The Peninsula in Hong Kong," he said.


what a nonsense statement...
Raffles is a heritage building, not a 'heritage-look-alike' building lah....while Peninsula HK, it is not a heritage-concept hotel, right?

what a nonsense statement...
Raffles is a heritage building, not a 'heritage-look-alike' building lah....while Peninsula HK, it is not a heritage-concept hotel, right?
Absolutely agree with you Osh. Can also add The Fullerton to this list.