Philippe GadboisThe Hotel Association of Canada (HAC) is pleased to announce the election of Philippe Gadbois as the new Chair of the HAC Board of Directors. Mr. Gadbois' new role is effective as of the Association's Annual General Meeting held in Toronto on Tuesday February 11, 2014. Philippe Gadbois has over 40 years of varied experience in the hotel industry including senior positions at Atlific Hotels, Realstar Hospitality Corp, the ownership of a fully integrated hotel consulting firm and Hilton International. Gadbois started his career with Hilton International at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal. He was then transferred to the Quebec Hilton. He returned to Montreal in 1985 where he was promoted to Vice President Sales and Marketing – Hilton Canada. A few years later, he moved to New York City to take on the responsibility of Vice President – Marketing for the Americas for Hilton International. In 1992, he was appointed General Manager of the Hilton Ottawa before being promoted to Chairman and President of Hilton Canada Inc. He then moved on to found DSP Hospitality Group whose raison d'être was to help developers bring their hotel projects to fruition. Clients included the owners of the Hilton Niagara Falls, the Waterloo Inn and Conference Centre, the Homewood Suites by Hilton Mont-Tremblant, the Bostonian Hotel in Ottawa, the Embassy Suites Niagara Falls, the Fairfield Inn Oakville and the Radisson Admiral in Toronto. In 2003, Gadbois joined Realstar Hospitality to spearhead the company's new development alliance with Accor Hospitality with the mandate of developing Novotel, Motel 6 and Studio 6 products throughout Canada. In partnership with Accor, Gadbois, on behalf of Realstar, spearheaded the development of a new Novotel prototype in Montreal to critical and commercial acclaim. In 2007, Gadbois joined Atlific Hotels, Canada's largest third party management company, as Senior Vice President Sales and Marketing with additional responsibilities to oversee their development function, and since has been appointed to Senior Vice President Operations, for the company. Achievements include the addition of two dozen management agreements in the past 5 years of both branded and unbranded hotels. Gadbois is currently Vice Chair of the Hotel Association of Canada and the founding Chairman of the Business Council for Tourism Issues. He sits on ownership committees for Starwood, InterContinental Hotels Group and Marriott Hotels. Gadbois is an Economics graduate of the Université de Montreal.