Leading British hotel chain Premier Inn today announced its entry into the domestic mid-market hospitality segment with the launch of its first hotel in Bangalore.

"There is a huge demand for cost-effective and quality rooms from both corporates and individual travellers," Premier Inn India managing director Aly Shariff told reporters at the launch.

The 105-room-hotel offers facilities like a multi-cuisine restaurant, gyms, bar and conference halls and is primarily targeted at corporates from the IT industry, he said.

Premier Inn is part of the leading British hotel and restaurant group Whitbread Plc. It plans to launch properties in New Delhi by late 2010 (142 rooms) and in Pune by early 2011 (125 rooms). It has also confirmed two other properties, he said but did not elaborate.

"We also subsequently plan to look at other metros and tier-2 cities", Aly said, adding the group would be investing around Rs 400 crore to develop these properties in the next three-five years. Together these five hotels would offer around 750 rooms.

The group would source this Rs 400 crore from equity markets as well as through debts, he said.

The introductory price for a room in the Bangalore property is Rs 2600 plus taxes, Aly said.

Currently, Premier operates 590 hotels with 40,000 rooms located in Britain and Dubai