InterContinental Hotels & Resorts is a luxury hotel brand created in 1946 by Pan Am founder Juan Trippe. It has been part of UK-based InterContinental Hotels Group since 1998.
History
thumb|Grande Hotel, Belém, Brazil, the chain's first property, seen in 1949
thumb|The [[InterContinental Vienna, the oldest continuously operating member of the chain, since 1964]]
thumb|Duna Inter-Continental Budapest, seen in 1974
Early years
In 1945, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Juan Trippe, President of Pan Am, discussed their concern for Latin America's need for development funds at a White House breakfast. The two men thought that one way to attract businessmen and tourists would be to offer luxury hotels in key cities. Trippe contacted Statler Hotels' chief executive H.B. Callis, and his company undertook a feasibility study, but the company decided the program would be too expensive. Trippe contacted multiple other US hotel chains, but none showed interest. Roosevelt requested that Pan Am take the lead in developing 5000 hotel rooms in Latin America, with a projected cost of $50,000,000. Pan Am's profit that year was only $3 million, so a $25,000,000 line of credit was arranged for Pan Am with the Export–Import Bank of the United States. Trippe agreed to form a subsidiary company to foster the implementation of the idea. The hotels would also serve to accommodate Pan Am crews and passengers in destinations where upscale hotels were not yet present. On 1 January 1950, Intercontinental assumed operation of its second hotel, the Hotel Carrera, in Santiago, Chile. Over the next three years, the company took over three more existing hotels – the Hotel del Prado in Barranquilla, Colombia; the Hotel Reforma in Mexico City and The Princess in Hamilton, Bermuda. In 1953, Intercontinental opened three newly constructed properties – the Hotel Victoria Plaza in Montevideo, the Hotel Tamanaco in Caracas and the Hotel del Lago in Maracaibo. That same year, they also opened the Hotel Tequendama in Bogotá, Colombia, the largest hotel in South America and the first hotel to be developed, designed and constructed completely under Intercontinental supervision. opening the Hotel Indonesia in Jakarta, Indonesia, in July, and The Southern Cross in Melbourne, Australia, in August. The first properties in Europe followed in May 1963, with simultaneous openings in Dublin, Cork and Limerick, Ireland. In 1964, Intercontinental became the first American hotel chain to operate in Eastern Europe, when it assumed management of the Hotel Esplanade in Zagreb, Yugoslavia. The chain would continue to be unique among western hospitality companies in operating behind the "Iron Curtain", opening properties in Budapest, Bucharest, Prague and Warsaw between 1968 and 1974.
The chain was officially rebranded as Inter•Continental Hotels in 1966, with the name commonly spelled with a hyphen as Inter-Continental when typed.
In 1972, Inter-Continental started a line of moderately priced hotels, called Forum Hotels. The first Forum property was the Lee Gardens Hotel in Hong Kong. Inter-Continental opened its first hotel in the United States in 1973, when it assumed management of the Mark Hopkins Hotel in San Francisco.
Post-Pan Am era
Facing significant financial losses, Pan Am sold their profitable Inter-Continental Hotels division to Grand Metropolitan on 19 August 1981 for $500 million. On 1 April 1982, the new owners merged their existing chain of 17 Grand Metropolitan Hotels into Inter-Continental and its sibling chain Forum Hotels.
Later in 1982, Inter-Continental formed a joint venture with Scanticon International, a Danish company that had opened a highly successful conference hotel near Princeton, New Jersey in 1981. Inter-Continental owned 80% of the business, with Scanticon controlling 20%. Additional Scanticon conference hotels were opened in Minneapolis and Denver, before InterContinental exited the joint venture in 1991.
Grand Metropolitan sold Inter-Continental Hotels to the Tokyo-based Seibu Saison Group on 1 October 1988 for $2.27 billion, for a profit of $850 million after taxes. On 20 February 1998, the Saison Group sold the chain to British brewer Bass PLC, for $2.9 billion.
In 2000, Bass sold its namesake brewing business, along with its name and red triangle trademark, to Interbrew, for £2.3 billion. On 27 June 2001, Bass renamed itself Six Continents, focusing on its hotels and its 2000 restaurants and bars. The name Six Continents was chosen from among 10,000 staff submissions, and was already the name of the Inter-Continental Hotels loyalty club. In 2003, Six Continents demerged its bar and pubs business into a separate company, Mitchells & Butlers, and the hospitality company was renamed InterContinental Hotels Group. At the same time, Inter-Continental Hotels dropped the hyphen in its name and became InterContinental Hotels. The chain is one of numerous brands today within the company.
Notable properties
InterContinental Los Angeles Downtown, located within the Wilshire Grand Center in downtown Los Angeles, is the largest InterContinental in the Americas and the tallest building in Los Angeles.
InterContinental manages the Willard InterContinental Hotel in downtown Washington, D.C., two blocks east of the White House. The -year-old hotel has hosted many heads of state.
The Inter-Continental Kabul opened in 1969, but ceased operation following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. The hotel continues to operate independently using the Inter-Continental name, but unaffiliated with the chain.
Properties
2003–2010
{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible mw-collapsed"
|-
!class="unsortable"| !! !! Americas !! Europe,<br>Middle East,<br>& Africa !! Asia-Pacific !! Total
|-
| rowspan=2| 2003 || Properties || 46 || 63 || 26 || 135
|-
| Rooms || 15,074 || 20,842 || 9,130 || 45,046
|-
| rowspan=2| 2004 || Properties || 44 || 62 || 26 || 132
|-
| Rooms || 15,088 || 20,292 || 9,136 || 44,516
|-
| rowspan=2| 2005 || Properties || 45 || 65 || 27 || 137
|-
| Rooms || 15,328 || 21,473 || 9,461 || 46,262
|-
| rowspan=2| 2006 || Properties || 49 || 66 || 33 || 148
|-
| Rooms || 16,525 || 21,423 || 11,651 || 49,599
|-
| rowspan=2| 2007 || Properties || 50 || 62 || 37 || 149
|-
| Rooms || 16,624 || 20,012 || 14,126 || 50,762
|-
| rowspan=2| 2008 || Properties || 55 || 64 || 40 || 159
|-
| Rooms || 18,502 || 20,836 || 15,398 || 54,736
|-
| rowspan=2| 2009 || Properties || 55 || 65 || 46 || 166
|-
| Rooms || 18,499 || 20,586 || 17,036 || 56,121
|-
| rowspan=2| 2010 || Properties || 56 || 64 || 51 || 171
|-
| Rooms || 19,120 || 20,111 || 19,198 || 58,429
|}
2011–2017
{| class="wikitable mw-collapsible mw-collapsed"
|-
!class="unsortable"| !! !! Americas !! Europe || Asia,<br>Middle East,<br>& Africa !! Greater China !! Total
|-
| rowspan=2| 2011 || Properties || 52 || 30 || 64 || 23 || 169
|-
| Rooms || 17,598 || 9,664 || 20,425 || 9,911 || 57,598
|-
| rowspan=2| 2012 || Properties || 53 || 30 || 65 || 22 || 170
|-
| Rooms || 17,756 || 9,394 || 20,791 || 9,373 || 57,314
|-
| rowspan=2| 2013 || Properties || 51 || 31 || 67 || 29 || 178
|-
| Rooms || 17,453 || 9,525 || 21,383 || 11,742 || 60,103
|-
| rowspan=2| 2014 || Properties || 50 || 30 || 67 || 33 || 180
|-
| Rooms || 16,897 || 9,372 || 21,424 || 13,542 || 61,235
|-
| rowspan=2| 2015 || Properties || 50 || 32 || 68 || 34 || 184
|-
| Rooms || 17,109 || 9,886 || 21,238 || 13,807 || 62,040
|-
| rowspan=2| 2016 || Properties || 48 || 31 || 69 || 39 || 187
|-
| Rooms || 16,408 || 9,724 || 21,203 || 16,315 || 63,650
|-
| rowspan=2| 2017 || Properties || 50 || 32 || 72 || 40 || 194
|-
| Rooms || 17,578 || 9,889 || 21,902 || 16,629 || 65,998
|}
From 2018
{| class="wikitable
|-
!class="unsortable"| !! !! Americas !! Europe,<br>Middle East,<br>Asia,<br>& Africa !! Greater China !! Total
|-
| rowspan=2| 2018 || Properties || 51 || 106 || 47 || 204
|-
| Rooms || 17,753 || 32,299 || 19,229 || 69,281
|-
| rowspan=2| 2019 || Properties || 51 || 113 || 48 || 212
|-
| Rooms || 17,896 || 33,515 || 19,570 || 70,981
|-
| rowspan=2| 2020 || Properties || 46 || 108 || 51 || 205
|-
| Rooms || 16,789 || 32,474 || 20,678 || 69,941
|-
| rowspan=2| 2021 || Properties || 43 || 108 || 53 || 204
|-
| Rooms || 15,651 || 32,561 || 21,190 || 69,402
|-
| rowspan=2| 2022 || Properties || 42 || 111 || 54 || 207
|-
| Rooms || 15,541 || 32,861 || 21,404 || 69,806
|-
| rowspan=2| 2023 || Properties || 43 || 119 || 60 || 222
|-
| Rooms || 15,674 || 34,443 || 23,383 || 73,500
|}