Hotel moves: Westin, Hyatt, Kempinski

Appointments have been made to an executive committee (above) of the Westin Qingdao – the city’s first Westin-branded hotel and the second Starwood property there alongside Le Meridien Qingdao.

Among the appointments are hotel manager Gian Piero Ruocco who has 20 years hotel experience starting in his native Italy then Thailand, India, China and elsewhere. He started with Starwood in 2007 at the Sheraton Shenzhen Futian. Prior to his appointment in Qingdao, he was hotel manager at Sheraton Guilin.

Isabella Yuan is director of sales and marketing and was previously DOSM at Sheraton Jiaozhou in 2011, where she was part of the opening team.

Marvin Ma combines his deputy general manger role with that of owner’s representative. With more than 20 year’s hotel management experience, he has served for various hotels in Dalian and Chengdu. The China National Tourist Administration appointed Marvin as ‘National Hotel Star Rating Auditor’ in 2007, and he has been involved in several hotel star-rating projects. He was also named as one of the ‘top 100’ most influential people in the Chinese hotel industry.

Philip Yu (left) has been named general manager of Grand Hyatt Hong Kong where he leads a team of more than 700 employees.

Yu joined Hyatt Hotels and Resorts in 2007 as resident manager and was part of the opening team of the Hyatt on the Bund, Shanghai.  He later moved to Grand Hyatt Shanghai as resident manager and was further promoted to hotel manager in 2009.  In June 2010, he was made general manager of Hyatt Regency Hangzhou. In 2011, the hotel was awarded second runner-up in result performance among Hyatt’s 483 worldwide hotels.

Before joining Hyatt, Mr Yu has held several key positions in Hong Kong Jockey Club, Renaissance Harbour View Hotel and Vancouver Radisson President Hotel.

Lim now manages the Dusit Fudu corporate office and oversees operations supporting the company’s China expansion plans. Lim, a Singaporean, has more than 30 years’ experience in the hospitality industry and managed luxury hotels in the United States and Asia.

Prior to joining Dusit Fudu, he was senior vice president – Asia for Millennium Copthorne Hotels, responsible for all hotels in Asia as well as the company’s corporate offices in Singapore and took part in the opening of a number of luxury hotels throughout Greater China and Singapore.

Lim holds an MBA from the Nanyang Business School at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and is also an honours graduate of the Hotel and restaurant management course from the University of Denver, Colorado.

Patrick Martinez (left) has been made general manager of Grand Kempinski Hotel Shanghai. He brings more than 20 years of luxury hospitality experience to the Pudoing hotel, which was previously the Gran Meliá Hotel Shanghai, and held a variety of general manager and senior management positions with Marriott International, InterContinental and Rotana Hotels.

David Traynor has been appointed director of sales and marketing for the hotel. He was formerly DOSM at the Shangri-La Hotel and Traders Hotel in Macau and before that assistant vice president of sales at Sands China.

Kurt Macher (below right) has joined Pan Pacific Singapore as resident manager along with Katsuhiko Okazaki who is director of guest services.

Macher has 18 years of board international experience in luxury hospitality including pre-opening and renovation projects, and was previously executives assistant manager at The Peninsula Hong Kong. A career highlight there was the US$58 million rooms renovation project and his management of the full implementation of associate training on innovative in-room technology.

Katsuhiko spent the first 13 years of his career in the entertainment industry before moving into his first hospitality role as guest relations officer with the Shangri-La Hotel, Hangzhou. This led to various roles within the Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts group, in cities such as Cairns and Tokyo. Most recently he was director of rooms at The Ritz-Carlton, Okinawa.

 

Hotel moves: Westin, Hyatt, Kempinski