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Abu Dhabi hotels receive Idex boost

The five-day defence event gathered the world leading weapons manufacturing companies, government leaders, military officials and business executives.

Abu Dhabi — The hotels in the capital had a busy week, with occupancies levels ranging between 95 and 100 per cent on account of the International Defence Exhibition and Conference, or Idex 2015, the world’s second biggest defence event that attracted business travellers in large numbers.

The highly successful five-day defence event gathered the world leading weapons manufacturing companies, government leaders, military officials and business executives, who shared ideas and information and learned about new defence systems displayed.

Over 1200 companies put up their pavilions while the number of visitors was expected to be in the range of 80,000.

Idex is Abu Dhabi’s flagship business show, which is held every two years. Other successful shows includes the World Future Energy Summit and exhibition, the annual sport event F1, and Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition or Adipec, which bring world’s top notch people.

Sharing his views, Francisco Giles, the general manager at Park Rotana said his five-star property reported 100 per cent occupancy, which is a seven per cent increase in the same week during the last month and up four per cent in the same period last year.

A senior executive at a hotel said the participants started arriving into the capital late last Wednesday and since then the occupancy levels began soaring up and up, and peaked on Saturday reaching 95-100 per cent at all the leading hotels and resorts.

The capital has a total of 160 hotels and hotel apartments with a room inventory of 28,600.

Abu Dhabi’s hotel occupancy in 2014 grew six per cent year-on-year to reach 75 per cent
Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture Authority (TCA Abu Dhabi) released numbers show that guest arrivals in 2014 totalled 3.494 million, reflecting a year-on-year rise of 25 per cent.

The higher occupancies mean higher room charges also, said a general manager at a newly opened three star hotel in Abu Dhabi. He said there was substantial increase in room charges, which rose up to 40 per cent, calling it a normal in such busy days of the season.

“The strong demand on the rooms has seen 11 per cent rise in the average room rates from the same period last month and six month growth during the same period last year,” Giles said.

These numbers show the importance of such events that occur in the city and reflect on the overall hotel performance, he said.

“Exhibitions like Idex are well awaited as they boost both average room rate and occupancy numbers during the dates they fall at,” says the general manager at Park Rotana Hotel.

“Idex is one of the biggest exhibitions held in the capital which attracts more than 80,000 visitors and 1,250 exhibitors from more than 59 countries from around the world. These huge numbers have their direct influence on hotel occupancies which witness full occupancy levels,” he said.

On what is the most interesting trend noticed during this Idex, he said this year, the defence show has witnessed one of the strongest years in terms of numbers of exhibitors and this was reflected on the expansion of the exhibited area at Adnec.

— haseeb@khaleejtimes.com