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Ford breaks ground on new plant in eastern China. Continue reading...

You’ve got your Holiday Inns. You’ve got your Ramadas. And for the last seven years, you’ve got your HanTing Inns.

And then some more HanTing  Inns. And still more. The Chinese economy hotel chain has been growing at such a clip it’s a bit like watching the broomsticks in Disney’s Fantasia continue to split and grow, split and grow, until there is an army of the things marching back and forth.

HanTing Inns, thankfully, can’t walk, which is a good thing. If they did, they’d be crushing the Chinese landscape. As it is, a new one opens on average every two days, according to CNN. 

Headquartered in Shanghai, HanTing now has 1,000 properties in China and billionaire founder Ji Qi is expecting to be the owner of the world’s biggest hotel chain by 2020, the site notes. Business is booming but what do you expect when some rooms go for as little as $15 a night.Continue reading...

In a sign that the world's leading economy is also the most resilient, China seems to have shrugged off a global slowdown—and nowhere is it more apparent than in China's expanding luxury hotel segment.

In six months, the Ritz-Carlton will open on the top fifteen floors of Hong Kong's 118-story International Commerce Center, becoming the world's highest hotel. The luxury chain will have eight hotels in China by year's end, up from just one four years ago.

Mark DeCocinis, regional general manager for Ritz-Carlton, tells the New York Times, "The Asian hotel market has come back stronger and more quickly than other parts of the world—and China is leading the way."

We've reported on the resurgence of luxury hotels in the Middle East, but China is outpacing every other part of the world.Continue reading...