Wah! Taj

Apart of the Indian Hotels CompanyLimited (IHCL), the Taj Hotels Resortsand Palaces is recognized as one of thelargest and finest hotel companies in Asia.Incorporated by the founder of the Tata group,Jamshedji Tata, the company started its flagshipproject-The Taj Mahal Palace hotel in 1903in Mumbai, which has transformed into asymbol of Indian hospitality.

Taj Hotels Resorts and Palaces comprise of64 hotels in 45 locations across India, with anadditional 15 international hotels. The mostsignificant additions to the Taj portfolio havebeen The Pierre, the iconiclandmark hotel on New York's FifthAvenue, The Taj Boston and TheBlue, Sydney. From world-renownedlandmarks to modern businesshotels, idyllic beach resorts toauthentic Rajput palaces, each Tajhotel offers an unrivaled fusion ofwarm Indian hospitality, world-classservice and modern luxury.

BUSINESS CHALLENGE

Like any other industry,opportunities and challenges in thehospitality sector are equallypredominant. Taj wanted the latestIP-based hotel communicationsolutions with future migrationoption to IP telephony and unifiedcommunication. To increase revenue,hotels often look at offering abouquet of value-added services,which would entice the guest andalso increase revenue. Earlier 'inroom' telephony was a good revenue earner forhotels. When guests made calls from the room,the hotels could charge a premium on theservice, but with mobile becoming mainstream and because of the low call tariff on mobiles,the revenue generated from the room phonesdecreased, making it impossible for hotels tobuy good systems. Thereafter, due to diminishingreturns on phone equipment, hotels resorted tolow-end phone systems. To add to it, the globalrecession has led to lower occupancy levels. Withthe influx of technology and sophisticatedsolutions, conventional sources of earningrevenue have dwindled.

SOLUTION

NEC-one of the leaders in innovative unifiedcommunication had a job to implement itssolution at eight locations, that includedTaj Falaknuma Palace in Hyderabad; TajYeshwantpur in Bengaluru, Taj Nadesar Palace in Varanasi and Taj Srinagar in Srinagar. Keepingin mind the challenges faced by Taj, NEC inassociation with its esteemed partner EnkayTechnologies, offered a solution, that not onlybrought down the total cost of ownership,but also helped in providing an array ofservices, that enabled Taj to offer a betterexperience to its guests. NEC India leveragedthe services of Enkay Technologies andoffered them a roadmap of next generationtechnology through NEC's latest UNIVERGESV8000 series IP Telephony Server. Thisserver has prominent hospitality features suchas PMS Integration interoperablewith multiple vendors, hotel operatorconsole, contact center applications,suite room services, open interfaceto various hospitality partners for callaccounting applications, rapidresponse systems, messagingservice over wireless devices andaesthetically designed digital and IPphones for the front and back-officeand key guest interaction areas. TheUNIVERGE SV8000 series from NECcreates new ways of generatingrevenue and increasing customerresponsiveness, while simultaneouslyimproving efficiency and reducingcosts. Designed to deliver next-generation, open standards-basedsolutions, it is a bridge to the futureand protects the existing telephoneinfrastructure investment whileproviding a migration path topure IP.

BENEFITS

NEC's UNIVERGE SV8000 series has provedbeneficial for the Taj group of hotels and thecustomized solution from NEC and Enkay suitedthe requirements of Taj. Prakash Shukla, Sr VP-Technology, and CIO, The Indian Hotels CompanyLimited said, "Being a leader in the hotelindustry, our endeavor at the Taj group of hotelsis to bring the most compelling environmentand experiences to our guests. We are gratifiedto utilize NEC's technology expertise for ourhotels. With the robust, feature-rich, scalableand interoperable solutions by NEC, we areassured that our network delivers the highestquality services that our customers demand."

THE ROADMAP

NEC has a roadmap to increase focus ondelivering hospitality solutions. NEC and TajHotels will constantly invest in their relationshipto introduce unique future-ready features. NECtogether with Enkay Technologies will strive toleverage innovation-driven solutions in theunified communications space for themodernization of communications portfolio inthe hospitality sector.

MUNTAZIR ABBAS
(muntazira@cybermedia.co.in)