Airport hospitality services Plaza Premium on expansion mode, to set up first Aerotel in India

The Plaza Premium Lounge, the Hong Kong based airport hospitality services provider, is on expansion mode in India, upgrading facilities in some of the airports, setting up new ones apart from its first Aerotel in the country at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Hyderabad.

Bhavya Kukreja, Head Marketing, Plaza Premium Group India Operations, said “apart from managing lounges for some of the leading airliners, alliances and banks, we also operate our own facilities offering convenience and comfort to travellers at various airports we have facilities.”

Speaking to Business Line, he said “The company plans to invest about Rs 500 crore towards upgradation and expansion of existing facilities, setting up new ones over the next few years. We are at advanced stage of developing our first Aerotel in Hyderabad and expect this to be operational by next year. It is now under construction by L&T.”

“We started our operations in 1988 in Hong Kong with a single facility and have gradually expanded to over 42 airports, 160 lounges across 25 countries. India is emerging as a major business hub and we plan to expand across airports in the country,” he said.

“We operate 18 lounges and cater to more than 15,000 passengers per day and expect this number to go up significantly as we set up more lounges and also commission our first Aerotel, an airport hotel in India at Hyderabad,” he said. “Thus far six airports have been privatised, the Government is expected to privatise 24 more. We look forward to engaging with more airports with our lounges,” he said.

About 10 years ago, airports were different with passengers just looking at their basic need of travelling and catching a fight. With expansion of airports and comfort being equally important, lounges have come to stay. If you take the case of Changi airport in Singapore, it is not just an airport but a destination zone. We expect airports to get more and more more comfortable offering a number of services, he explains.

In the past, there was space crunch in airports. With new airports coming up and existing ones being expanded, it offers a services provider like us an opportunity to offer our services. The company’s service offered through Allways in Delhi will also be expanded to other cities and talks are at advanced stage with couple of airports. Allways provides buggy, porter service, lounge access and transit assistance.

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