Thistle&GuomanHotels expects to reduce its IT
running costs by up to 30% through a two-year programme of
centralisation and standardisation across the hotel
group.
The programme will include a re-evaluation of the hotel group's
IT governance, security and
disaster recovery systems.
The project supports the hotel group's long-term aims to expand
into new markets beyond the UK. Standard software, hardware and
procedures will make the management of IT much easier, said newly
appointed IT director Dipesh Joshi, who was formerly at QMH
Hotels.
The project will reduce running and support costs, improve the
way IT supports the business, and give the IT department better
control over the IT purchasing decisions made by each hotel, he
said.
"It is a complete rework of how we work and a culture shift in
the way IT interacts with the business. Historically, we have been
seen as a reactive service, and I am trying to change that to make
us more proactive in leading the business forward," said Joshi.
In the first phase of the programme, the company has rolled out
a single
electronic point of sale system to each hotel, and has created
a central property management systems (PMS).
The PMS systems will enable Thistle & Guoman to see room
availability across the whole group from any of its 38 UK sites
using the latest version of the Opera PMS for the Guoman brand and
Fidelio PMS for the Thistle brand.
"We believe we are an early adopter taking this approach with
our PMS which underpins our whole business," said Joshi.
Joshi said after the relaunch of the Thistle and Guoman websites
at the end of April, customers will be able to tap to check the
availability of rooms in each hotel.
The websites have been re-designed to promote online sales by
providing a one-stop service for making bookings, upgrading rooms
and purchasing additional services.
The group plans to upgrade its IT infrastructure from standard
servers to more robust, scalable blade servers. This will allow the
group to grow of capacity as it expands into Asia.
"Standards and controls will become increasingly important as we
move away from being just a hotel owner to a hotel management
company for future operations," said Joshi.
Other future plans include pulling IT project expertise and
strategic research and development back in-house.
"Areas of IT such as datacentre operations make perfect sense to
outsource, but others that are core to our business should be
supported by expertise within and not led by suppliers," he
said.