China Lodging Group, a leading and fast-growing multi-brand hotel group in China, today announced that it has entered into a five-year Memorandum of Understanding ("MoU") on September 8, 2017 with Oravel Stays Private Ltd. ("OYO"), India's leading hospitality company, to facilitate and strengthen collaboration to build a global market leading hospitality business.
Under the MoU, China Lodging Group and OYO will explore opportunities for mutual collaboration in four fields: (i) knowledge and technology sharing, (ii) strategic alliances and partnerships in various areas, including but not limited to local sourcing and procurement and joint loyalty programs, (iii) new venture partnership opportunities, and (iv) investment. As part of this collaboration, China Lodging Group has agreed to make a USD 10 million equity investment in OYO to become a minority shareholder (less than 5%). China Lodging Group and OYO will also discuss collaboration in a variety of other areas of mutual interests pursuant to the MoU.
Speaking about the partnership, Jenny Zhang, CEO of China Lodging Group, said, "We are delighted to announce our strategic alliance with OYO. The MoU signifies the shared aspirations of China Lodging Group and OYO to explore growing opportunities in the global hospitality industry and to create synergies by working together. The partnership will draw on the strengths of China Lodging Group's visionary and experienced management team, market leadership through a multi-brand strategy, extensive hotel operations expertise and strong loyalty program and OYO's advanced technologies in the hospitality industry that enable transformation of hotel operations."
Ritesh Agarwal, Founder & CEO of OYO, said, "We are very excited about this partnership — both in terms of potential opportunities and existing synergies through our complementary strengths and capabilities. China Lodging Group has a visionary and experienced leadership team and hotel operations expertise especially in managing large properties. OYO is a new-age technology company disrupting the hospitality industry with category-leading capabilities of using technology to onboard and transform existing supply, standardize operations and distribute these through online and offline channels. Addressing consumers in India and China — two of the world's fastest-growing markets — through our combined strengths opens up a very large and significant growth opportunity."
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