Mutiara Beach Resort in Penang Island Rebrand Plan On Hold

According to Business Times report, The Mutiara Beach Resort in Penang Island renovation and rebrand plan has been put off indefinitely.

The Mutiara Beach Resort is belongs to Tradewinds Corp Bhd (TCB) and is on a 4.05ha land in Jalan Teluk Bahang,

 The 20-year-old property, which has been closed for some 41 months now since 2006, was to be renovated and rebranded as an InterContinental Resort Penang. However, TCB and InterContinental have now mutually terminated the management contract early this year, 2009. 

However, he dismissed talks that it may sell the hotel located on a 4.05ha land in Jalan Teluk Bahang, Tradewinds Corp Bhd plans to develop the hotel at a later stage.

TCB, which owns eight other hotels in the country, is controlled by businessman Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhary.

A year ago, TCB chairman Tan Sri Megat Najmuddin Megat Khas said that it had scrapped its initial plans to halve the room inventory and build luxury residences at the hotel.

It had instead decided to have only hotel rooms, as otherwise the return on investment will not commensurate with the cost of building the property.

TCB had planned to reduce the inventory of the 438-room property to 220 rooms and include 80 units of luxury residences. The cost at the time was estimated at around RM100 million.

The residences were to be sold at around RM500 per sq ft and leased back. The hotel was supposed to reopen at the end of 2008.

The reopening date was then changed to mid-2009.

TCB's hotel portfolio includes Crowne Plaza Mutiara Kuala Lumpur, Hotel Istana, Hilton Petaling Jaya and Mutiara Johor Baru.