Plans to upgrade Dubai's Rose Rayhaan - the world's tallest hotel - to a five-star grade have been delayed, a leading executive from operators the Rotana group told Arabian Business.
“Our plans are to convert the hotel into a five-star hotel over the next five months. We need to build a new restaurant and make some modifications to the units in the rooms. It’s not a complicated process but will take about six to twelve months,” Omer Z Kaddouri, senior vice president for UAE operations at Rotana, said in January at the official launch of the hotel.
However, Kaddouri said Bonyan International Investment Group, the owners of the $180m 333 metre tall hotel, had now delayed the plans for the upgrading.
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"That was the plan, the owners wanted to develop it into a five star hotel and we opened as a four. They still have plans to do that but... it might be pushed a little bit further into the future," he said on Wednesday at the Arabian Travel Market in Dubai.
"We are staying as a four star hotel today and over the next 24 months we will start the five star process. We have got to make sure the hotel becoming successful first." he added.
Kaddouri said that the hotel was currently enjoying an average occupancy of about 65 percent, "which we are happy with." He added that the recent price wars in the Dubai hotel sector had taken a toil on the hotel's average rates.
"In the part four or five months there has been a bit of a price war so the rate has not been what we had anticipated it to be. We are running about 20 percent behind what we anticipated," he said.
The new hotel will operate under the group's alcohol-free brand, the second in the group after the Al Marwa Rayhaan in Makkah, Saudi Arabia.
The Rose Rayhaan by Rotana’s title as the world’s tallest hotel has been certified by the Guinness Book of World Records.
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