Taj Mumbai Gets Refurbished With the Latest Communications Solutions

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DQI Bureau
New Update

Apart of the Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCL), the Taj Hotels Resorts
and Palaces is recognized as one of the largest and finest hotel companies in Asia. They comprise 64 hotels in 45 locations across India, with an additional 15 international hotels.

Business Challenge

Like any other industry, opportunities and challenges in the hospitality sector are equally predominant. Taj wanted the latest IP based hotel communication solutions with future migration option to IP telephony and unified communication. To increase revenue, hotels often look at offering a bouquet of value-added services, which would entice the guest and also increase revenue. Earlier in room telephony was a good revenue earner for hotels. When guests made calls from the room, the hotels could charge a premium on the service, but with mobile becoming mainstream and because of the low call tariff on mobiles, the revenue generated from the room phones decreased, making it impossible for hotels to buy good systems. Thereafter, due to diminishing returns on phone equipment, hotels resorted to low-end phone systems. To add to it, the global recession has led to lower occupancy levels. With the influx of technology and sophisticated solutions, conventional sources of earning revenue have dwindled.

Solution

NECone of the leaders in innovative unified communication had a job to implement its solution at eight locations, that included
Taj Falaknuma Palace in Hyderabad; Taj Yeshwantpur in Bengaluru, Taj Nadesar Palace in Varanasi and Taj Srinagar in Srinagar. Keeping in mind the challenges faced by Taj, NEC in association with its esteemed partner Enkay Technologies, offered a solution, that not only brought down the total cost of ownership, but also helped in providing an array of services, that enabled Taj to offer a better experience to its guests. NEC India leveraged the services of Enkay Technologies and offered them a roadmap of next generation technology through NECs latest UNIVERGE SV8000 series IP Telephony Server. This server has prominent hospitality features such as PMS Integration interoperable with multiple vendors, hotel operator console, contact center applications, suite room services, open interface to various hospitality partners for call accounting applications, rapid response systems, messaging service over wireless devices and aesthetically designed digital and IP phones for the front and back-office and key guest interaction areas. The UNIVERGE SV8000 series from NEC creates new ways of generating revenue and increasing customer responsiveness, while simultaneously improving efficiency and reducing costs. Designed to deliver next-generation, open standards based solutions, it is a bridge to the future and protects the existing telephone infrastructure investment while providing a migration path to
pure IP.

Benefits

NECs UNIVERGE SV8000 series has proved beneficial for the Taj group of hotels and the customized solution from NEC and Enkay suited the requirements of Taj. Prakash Shukla, senior VP, technology, and CIO, The Indian Hotels Company says, Being a leader in the hotel industry, our endeavor at the Taj group of hotels is to bring the most compelling environment and experiences to our guests. We are gratified to utilize NECs technology expertise for our hotels. With the robust, feature-rich, scalable and interoperable solutions by NEC, we are assured that our network delivers the highest quality services that our customers demand.

The Roadmap

NEC has a roadmap to increase focus on delivering hospitality solutions. NEC and Taj Hotels will constantly invest in their relationship to introduce unique future-ready features. NEC together with Enkay Technologies will strive to leverage innovation-driven solutions in the unified communications space for the modernization of communications portfolio in the hospitality sector.

Muntazir abbas /DQ Channels
maildqindia@cybermedia.co.in