The 20th Edition of the Hotel Investment Conference - South Asia (HICSA) 20 Years: Past, Present & Prophecies

• Presenting HICSA 2025: Hosted by Hotelivate

Tuesday, April 15:  The Hotel Investment Conference – South Asia (HICSA) 2025, organised by Hotelivate, successfully concluded its 20th edition at The Westin Mumbai Powai Lake, marking a milestone moment in the evolution of South Asia’s most influential hospitality investment summit.

This landmark edition drew over 770 delegates from across 16 countries, bringing together global hotel owners, investors, operators, developers, lawyers, bankers, and consultants to engage in powerful dialogue on the future of hospitality in South Asia and beyond. With over 100 influential speakers and 30 thoughtfully curated sessions, the two-day conference offered invaluable insights into a wide array of topics — including investment trends, brand performance, sustainability, AI in hospitality, and the evolving role of alternative accommodations, among many others. The closed-door Owners’ Only Workshop saw over 170 owners in attendance, with some interesting topics being covered like “Creating Efficient Back of the House”, “Legal Challenges Faced in the Past and Present”, Owner centric panels, to name a few. 

“The 20th edition of HICSA was more than a milestone — it was a powerful statement about the future of hospitality in South Asia. While we took a moment to honour our journey, the real focus was on what lies ahead. The conversations sparked, partnerships formed, and ideas exchanged over these two days will undoubtedly influence the trajectory of our industry. We are deeply grateful to our delegates, speakers, patrons, and sponsors whose unwavering support and enthusiasm made this celebration of all things hospitality truly exceptional.”

Manav Thadani, Founder Chairman - Hotelivate

The conference featured some exclusive interviews and keynote addresses of some notable speakers such as Kevin Goh - Chief Executive Officer, Lodging, CapitaLand Investment Limited, Chief Executive Officer, The Ascott Limited, Vikram Oberoi - Chief Executive Officer & MD, The Oberoi Group, Ritesh Agarwal - Founder & Group CEO, OYO, Kenneth Macpherson - Chief Executive Officer, Europe, Middle East, Asia & Africa, IHG Hotels & Resorts, Sébastien Bazin - Chairman and CEO, Accor, to name a few. It also saw some interesting topics being covered like “AI in Hospitality”, “Chasing the Leisure Traveller”, “Franchising and Third Party” and “Hospitality Real Estate, Capital Markets”. Amongst other speakers were global leaders such as Dillip Rajakarier - Group CEO, Minor International , CEO, Minor Hotels, Dimitris Manikis - President – Europe, Middle East, Eurasia, & Africa, Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, Gaurav Bhushan - Co - CEO, Ennismore, Haitham Mattar - Managing Director – Middle East, Africa & South West Asia, IHG Hotels & Resorts, Sunjae Sharma- Managing Director - India & Southwest Asia – Hyatt, Jatin Khanna - Chief Executive Officer, Sarovar Hotels, Camil Yazbeck - Global Chief Development Officer - Premium, Midscale & Economy, Accor, Elie Younes - Executive Vice President & Global Chief Development Officer, Radisson Hotel Group, Suma Venkatesh - Executive Vice President - Real Estate & Development, IHCL to name a few. 

HICSA also featured curated panel discussions and mini keynote sessions with industry leaders. While each session was well attended, the “General Manager to CEO - The Journey” panel with Anil Chadha - Managing Director, ITC Hotels,  Anuraag Bhatnagar - Chief Executive Officer, The Leela Palaces, Hotels & Resorts, Dr. Sanjay Sethi - Managing Director & CEO, Chalet Hotels and Rajeev Menon - President - Asia Pacific (excluding China) - Marriott International, as panellists and  Mohit Nirula - Chief Operating Officer, The Oberoi Group, as the moderator gets a special mention as it received a standing ovation. Other topics of interest included " Buying into Luxury", "Hotel Valuations: Who is Buying, Building What and Where?", " Branded Residences & Villas", “Impact of Pollution” and many more. 

The curated experiences and awards at HICSA were well received and celebrated. ‘HICSA Hotels of the Year Awards’ presented by MakeMyTrip, saw seven winners across the seven categories and a critic’s choice award. The winner of the Critics’ Choice Award was The Lotus Palace, Chettinad. The winners across the other six categories were: ITC Ratnadipa, a Luxury Collection Hotel, Colombo in the Luxury Hotels Segment; Hilton Kathmandu for the Upscale/Upper Upscale Hotels segment; Hyatt Place Aurangabad Airport in the Upper Midmarket Hotels Segment; Moxy Bengaluru Airport Prestige Tech Cloud in the Budget & Midmarket Segment; Morickap Lords 83, Trademark Collection by Wyndham in the Boutique Segment and Hyatt Centric Ballygunge Kolkata in the Conversion – Urban Segment and Ronil Goa - JDV by Hyatt in the Conversion – Leisure Segment.

The General Manager of the Year Awards, presented by MakeMyTrip was another highlight this year. These awards are a wonderful opportunity to recognise and highlight the hard work and outstanding performance displayed by the General Managers untiringly running the show. For the Budget and Economy Category, the winner was Prafull Dhapate - Holiday Inn Express, Pune Pimpri, for the Midmarket/ Upper Midmarket segment – the winner was Divakar Shukla – Holiday Inn Chennai OMR IT Expressway, in the Upscale / Upper Upscale category, the winners was Amardeep Singh – The Westin Resort and Spa Himalayas, and for the Luxury Category, the winner was Abhimanyu Singh Lodha - The Lodhi New Delhi. The closing cocktails and the “After-Hours” at The Fairmont Mumbai were the perfect end to the 20th edition of HICSA.

Looking Ahead

With the successful culmination of HICSA 2025, Hotelivate is now gearing up for the 21st edition of HICSA and planning to bring it back better than ever. HICSA 2026 will return to Mumbai on the 8th and 9th of April 2026. The next big event on the calendar is the 10th edition of THINC Indonesia in Bali on 3rd—4th September 2025. As the company expands its global hospitality footprint, its commitment to innovation, collaboration, and thought leadership remains stronger.

About Hotelivate

Hotelivate is a new-age hospitality consulting firm offering specialized services to clients across the Asia Pacific region. Founded by the erstwhile team of HVS India, Hotelivate, offers a comprehensive consulting environment through a diverse team of consultants that have a combined professional experience of 250 years across varied hospitality verticals. The firm presently has offices in Delhi, Mumbai, Singapore, Bangkok and Dubai. The founding partners of Hotelivate are reputed hospitality business consultants, who have advised, assisted, and nurtured thousands of clients for more than two decades in South Asia.

Through its focused, empathetic, and innovative approach, Hotelivate serves a wide range of industry stakeholders across all phases of hospitality lifecycle consulting, thereby eliminating the need for several different advisors. Specifically, Hotelivate assists clients right from inception to divestment of their hospitality ventures, by offering an entire spectrum of services that are practical and tangible value-adds for clients.

In addition, Hotelivate hosts some of Asia Pacific’s most successful conferences, namely Hotel Investment Conference – South Asia (HICSA), Hotel Operations Summit India (HOSI), and Tourism Hotel Investment & Networking Conference (THINC) Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Middle East. For more information, please visit - hotelivate.com

About HICSA

To address the growing need for a uniform platform for industry participants to exchange ideas and discuss the future of the hospitality industry, the annual Hotel Investment Conference − South Asia (HICSA) was launched in 2005. Today, the conference is globally recognized as the most impressive and unique platform to explore growth and investment opportunities both within and outside India. 

Valued for its networking opportunities and high-level contacts as much as for its content-rich sessions, HICSA, over the last 20 years, has witnessed unprecedented support and appreciation from the hospitality industry. It attracts overwhelming participation from hotel owners, investors, operators, bankers, and industry specialists who come together to share their best practices, new ideas and latest market trends. For more information, please visit - hicsaconference.com

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