User:Zazalong/Huazhu Hotels Group

Huazhu Hotels Group Ltd (NASDAQ: HTHT；01179.HK ) is a hotel management company in China, ranked as No.7 Hotel Group around the world in 2021 by HOTELS. Huazhu Hotels Group operated 6,187 properties in 16 countries around the world. It was previously known in English as China Lodging Group Limited. The company head office is in Changning District, Shanghai. The first Hotel of Huazhu Hotels Group opened at Kunshan Railway Station store trial operation in August 2005.

Founder
Qi Ji (simplified Chinese: 季琦; pinyin: Jì qí) is born in Nantong, Jiangsu Province, China at October 1966, and he graduate from Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 1992;

QI Ji is ranked as #705 Billionaires 2021 and #178 China Rich List 2020 on FORBOS LISTS, who is the founder and CEO of Huazhu Hotels Group, One of the founders of Ctrip (NASDAQ:CTRP), and founder of Home INNS & HOTELS MANAGEMENT INC (NASDAQ:HMIN)

What does Huazhu means
Huazhu means China Loading (simplified Chinese:中华住宿) in Chinese, which means the representation of the Hotel Industry in China.

History
The China Lodging/Hanting Inns business was established in 2005. The original company, Powerhill, was established in 2005, and the current Huazhu company was established in 2007. Ji Qi, the founder, stated that he got the idea to start the chain by reading a book discussing Accor Hotels. As of 2012, the company had four brands and about 1,000 properties in China.

In August 2005, the first Hanting Hotel opened at Kunshan Railway Station.

In April 2006, Hanting official website officially opened.

In September 2006, Hanting loyalty system -- Hanting Association (now HuaZhu Rewards) was established.

In July 2007, Hanting completed the first round of financing of $85 million.

In July 2007, Hanting opened its online booking website.

In June 2008, the total number of stores opened reached 100.

In February 2010, Hanting Hotel officially changed its name to Ji Hotel.

In March 2010, Hanting was successfully listed on NASDAQ.

In November 2012, "Hanting Hotel Group" officially changed its name to "Huazhu Hotels Group."

In July 2013, Huazhu Hotels Group have operated hotels in more than 200 cities.

In December 2014, Huazhu Hotels Group (NASDAQ:HTHT) signed a long-term strategic alliance agreement with Accor in France.

In May 2015, the company announced that former President Jenny Zhang was to be appointed Chief Executive Officer. In 2017, Huazhu Hotel Group acquired Crystal Orange Hotel Group for CNY3.65 billion.

In January 2016, Huazhu and Accor Hotels finalize their strategic alliance.

In 2018, Huazhu Announces Acquisition of Blossom Hill Hotels & Resorts.

In August 2018, the company faced a major data breach, wherein millions of customer data was leaked and sold on the dark web.

On November 4, 2019, it was announced that the company; through one of their subsidiaries has purchased Deutsche Hospitality for 700 million Euro.

Loyalty program
HuaZhu Rewards is the Membership Loyalty Program of Huazhu Hotels Group. HuaZhu Rewards' members will be able to earn points by spending money for staying or convert their Accor Hotels loyalty program's points into HuaZhu Rewards. Members can also redemption their points for free nights, breakfast, and gifts. There are more than 170 million members in HuaZhu Rewards.

In 2020, there were more than 169 million loyal members, who accounted for 74 percent of overnight sales last year.

Huazhu Brands
Huazhu Hotels Group operated more than 25 different Hotel Brands around 16 countries that cover from Luxury to Economy.

Recognition
According to the data from Hospitality ON, Huazhu Hotels Group ranked as No.4 highest value Hotel Group around the world in 2021.

Partnership with Accor
On December 15, 2014, Huazhu signed a long-term strategic alliance agreement with Accor to jointly expand its hotel business in China. According to the agreement, Mercure, Novotel, Mercure, Ibis Style and Ibis will be operated by Huazhu in China and Mongolia.

Accor and Huazhu will continue to develop the successful partnership that started in January 2016. Under franchise agreements, 300 economy and middle-scale hotels have opened in China, mainly under the Ibis, Novotel, and Mercure brands. Over the next three years, more than 200 properties are planned to open.

Purchasing of Deutsche Hospitality
China Lodging Holding Singapore, A wholly owned subsidiary of Huazhu Hotels Group, has completed the acquisition of 100% equity interest in Deutsche Hospitality (" DH ").

Deutsche Hotels Group (DH) is a German hotel group with more than 10,500 employees. Its five major hotel brands include Steigenberger, MAXX by Steigenberger, IntercityHotel, Design hotel brands, Jaz in the City, and Zleep.

DH is distributed in 19 countries in Europe, Asia, and Africa, such as Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Spain, Egypt, united Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia. Steigenberger Hotel, located in Davos, Switzerland, is the main venue and reception hotel of the annual World Economic Forum (also known as "Davos Forum"). Its high-quality reception service enjoys a high reputation in the world.

Incidents of Huazhu Hotels
On August 28, 2018, it was reported that user data of a hotel chain belonging to Huazhu Group was sold on the dark net. On the afternoon of August 28, an official of Huazhu Group responded to the incident, saying, "We have called the police. The authenticity can not be verified at present, our information security department is in urgent processing." On September 17, 2018, Huazhu Group made an official statement to the public and reported the case to the public security organ. According to the public security authorities, the case has been solved, the suspects took advantage of the public opinion, to carry out extortion, attempted. Whether the suspects' claims on the dark web are true or not will be officially released after the investigation is completed.