Omni Batavia Hotel to open in early '95

JAKARTA (JP): The Omni Batavia Hotel will likely open in the first quarter of 1995, six months earlier than was originally scheduled.

Yesterday, Roy Yan, Omni's regional sales director, said that the advance opening is due to the fact that construction has moved along faster than expected.

The nine-story, four-star hotel with 389 rooms, is located in the Chinatown area of Glodok, West Jakarta. It is now being developed by the owner, PT Wahana Andamari, a subsidiary of a widely diversified Tamara Group.

Wahana Andamari is financing 50 percent of the US$56 million investment while the other half is funded by loans from a syndication of 10 local banks, including Bank Tamara, Bank Bali, Panin Bank, Bank Umum Nasional, Bank Central Dagang, Inter Pacific Bank and PDFCI Bank.

The hotel will be managed by Omni Hotels Asia Pacific, a division of Omni Hotels Group.

Omni Hotels Group is a hotel management chain which owns, operates and franchises 40 first class hotels in the United States, Mexico, Hong Kong, China, Vietnam and Singapore, with a total of 18,300 rooms.

Roy Yan told The Jakarta Post that Omni Batavia is expected to bring back the charm of the Dutch colonial era. Even it's name hearkens back to times past, using the ancient name of Jakarta which was Batavia.

Character

The same impression was expressed by Michael C. Kalyk, the president of Omni Hotels Asia Pacific. He said the unique character of the Glodok district will ensure that it will gain importance as a business district, and also develop into a major tourist attraction in years to come.

Kalyk said that the strong Dutch architectural influence in the district will be reflected in the hotel's design.

The architecture of Omni Batavia is being handled by a domestic firm, PT Perentjana Pjaja, while a Singaporean interior designer, David Tay, was assigned to work on its interiors.

According to Roy, the hotel expects to get 15 percent of its guests from the crews of international airlines and 15 percent from domestic travelers. Omni's international reservation network is expected to generate the other 70 percent.

The estimate of the guest composition was made based on the hotel's location near the Jakarta international airport, central train station and the Tanjung Priok port.(03)