Lawrence Alexander is being appointed chief executive officer of easyHotel.
He will oversee all current franchisees but will primarily be responsible for finding and managing future franchisees to ensure easyHotel becomes a global player in the so called sub-budget hotel sector by continuing to offer much better prices than current branded budget hotels like Ibis and Travelodge, shared the company.

As chief executive officer he plans to establish a strong management team to guarantee the growth of the company leading to a stock market listing in the next three-five years. Stelios will remain as chairman of easyHotel for the foreseeable future.

He was commercial director of Jarvis, which, as part of its portfolio of 5000 hotel rooms has held a Ramada franchise since 2001.

The company shared that easyHotel is about to report its second profitable year. The business model is established and the company is now poised to go through a period of substantial growth. easyHotel launched initially as an online brokerage service in 2004, offering rooms from a selection of 20,000 hotels worldwide.

The current partnership with Octopus, is now being put out to tender with Octopus and others being invited to bid.

The first easyHotel opened in August 2005 in Kensington, London; the hotel, a test-bed for future developments, is owned and operated by the company.

The first franchisee opened an easyHotel in Switzerland in September 2005 and there are currently two further hotel properties in London (Victoria and Earls Court) being converted into easyHotels, due to open in late 2006.

In addition the easyGroup has granted a master franchise license to Istithmar, a Dubai based investment house, to open 38 easyHotels across the Middle East, India and North Africa in the next five years. The construction cost of these 38 hotels will amount to $400 million US.
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