Starwood Hotels Introduces Its First Westin in India with the Signing of the Westin New Delhi Hotel & Residences

The Westin New Delhi Hotel will feature 300 rooms, five restaurants, 17,500 square feet of meeting space, a 16,000 square-foot health and spa center, as well as upscale retail outlets. Located strategically in Gurgaon, the emerging central business district of New Delhi, the hotel will provide travelers easy access to key convention and commercial offices.

Vatika Group is also developing a major residential complex in Vatika City, a five minute drive from the hotel. The Westin New Delhi Residences will be comprised of 150 Westin managed residences offering a selection of 1,500 high-end two, three, four and five bedroom apartments which will be sold to individual owners.

"This year, tourist arrivals to India have been growing at a rate of close to 20% compared with last year," said Miguel Ko, President, Starwood Hotels & Resorts, Asia-Pacific. "We are very excited to be working in partnership with Vatika Group to introduce Westin and its many innovative and signature services and products to travelers visiting New Delhi in the future. We expect this to be the first of several hotel projects we will work on with Vatika."

India, Asia's fourth largest economy, has been very aggressive and successful with driving tourism to showcase everything from its beautiful beaches and mountains to spiritual and rural destinations. New Delhi, India's capital city, is located in northern India, and is the country's center of government and home to many governmental officials. Gurgaon, situated south-west of the capital in the state of Haryana, is among the fastest growing satellite cities in India. Gurgaon began its development as a major satellite city of Delhi in the early 1990s and since then, close to 15 million square feet of commercial space has been developed, housing various multi-national companies that prefer the location in the satellite city due to availability of space, quality office space and relatively more affordable rents, which are limited in the current New Delhi central business district.

Starwood Hotels & Resorts expanded its portfolio in Asia significantly over the last year with the opening of five new hotels in 2004 and a strong development pipeline is in place with 23 hotels under development throughout Asia Pacific scheduled to open over the next four years.

Westin Hotels & Resorts, with 121 hotels and resorts in 31 countries and territories, is owned by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. and was ranked "Highest in Guest Satisfaction Among Upscale Hotels Chains." in the J.D. Power and Associates' 2004 North America Hotel Guest Satisfaction Study(SM) and voted Best Domestic Hotel Chain by Global Traveler Magazine. Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. is one of the leading hotel and leisure companies in the world with approximately 750 properties in more than 80 countries and 120,000 employees at its owned and managed properties. With internationally renowned brands, Starwood(R) corporation is a fully integrated owner, operator and franchisor of hotels and resorts including: St. Regis(R), The Luxury Collection(R), Sheraton(R), Westin(R), Four Points(R) by Sheraton, and W(R), Hotels and Resorts as well as Starwood Vacation Ownership, Inc., one of the premier developers and operators of high quality vacation interval ownership resorts. For more information, please visit www.starwoodhotels.com