The name of the hotel will change to Holiday Inn Resort, with "Regent Beach Cha-am" tagged under the new title. The InterContinental group will manage the major part of the hotel, containing 560 rooms, and Regent will retain responsibility for two smaller parts, the Regent Chalet Cha-am and Pet Resort Cha-am.

The InterContinental Group plans to overhaul the hotel's business systems within four months, including its IT system, which will be updated for competitive online reservations, its security system, to take care of regional convention groups, and its marketing system.

The overhaul will cost Bt300 million, said the hotel's managing director, Piyaman Tachapaiboon.

Holiday Inn executives will take seats on a changed executive board. However, Piyaman will remain the managing director.

She said Regent was not strong in attracting international customers, particularly corporate clients who like to arrange meetings outside their companies, individual customers who like to travel without using travel agencies, and international family groups. Until now, most of the hotel's guests have been walk-in customers or those booked by travel agencies.

Regent is hoping the Holiday Inn connection will attract international visitors, as well as corporate meeting groups. This will allow the hotel to increase its room rate, in the case of groups, from the present Bt1,500 to Bt2,000 before the end of the year. Its general room rate, however, will remain at Bt1,500 per night to maintain its local trade.

Piyaman said the partners had an agreement on revenue sharing which means Regent's earnings will vary year by year.

The hotel hopes its occupancy rate will rise from 50 per cent to between 65 and 70 per cent within two years. However, it wants to maintain its current proportion of 50-per-cent international guests and 50-per-cent local.

After the two partners complete their overhaul of the hotel's business systems, Piyaman said her next plan was to develop three areas owned by her family - in Cha-am, near Suvarnabhumi Airport and in Pattaya.

She expects that within three years she will develop the 80-hectare Cha-am site into another hotel or resort, but with a totally different style to the Regent. The other developments will cover 64 hectares near the new airport, and nearly 10 hectares in Pattaya.

Piyaman believes tourism in the Cha-am area will be significantly boosted by three more hotel chains opening in the area, with a total of more than 500 rooms. At present, however, she blames negative economic factors and the World Cup for holding the number of visitors down.