Hyatt Hotels to Take Over Management of Irvine Hilton

IRVINE —  Confirming weeks of rumors, The Irvine Co. said Tuesday that Hyatt Hotels Corp. has been chosen to take over management of the 550-room Irvine Hilton.

When Hyatt assumes control on Oct. 16, the hotel will be renamed the Hyatt Regency Irvine at Jamboree Center. A Hyatt official said that the staff of 480 Hilton employees are being retained and that Hilton is reassigning many of its managers to other properties.

Hilton Hotels Corp. announced in August that it was withdrawing from management of the hotel after five years so that it could be free to develop a new property in the area around John Wayne Airport. Under its agreement with the hotel’s owner, The Irvine Co., Hilton was barred from operating a competing property in the immediate area.

The fifth largest hotel in Orange County, the Irvine Hilton is situated off the Jamboree Road exit of the San Diego Freeway. The 12-story hotel includes more than 30,000 square feet of meeting space and a 14,700-square-foot Grand Ball Room.

Though Hyatt was mentioned from the start as a possible successor to Hilton, an Irvine Co. official said Tuesday that the company was one of several hotel operators contacted about management of the Irvine Hilton.

The choice of Hyatt further cements a relationship between the companies that grew last February when Irvine chose Hyatt to build a new 450-room luxury hotel on the coast south of Corona del Mar. The Newport Coast project, the largest undeveloped parcel remaining on Orange County’s coastline, is also the site planned for two golf courses and 2,600 homes.

Don McNutt, vice president and general manager of the Irvine Hotel Co., said that Hyatt is “certainly a high-quality operator with a recognized name and all the credentials to operate the hotel.” He said the two companies have entered into a long-term agreement and no major changes are anticipated in the operation or expansion or the hotel in the near term.

He said the hotel has averaged an occupancy rate between 60% and 70%. Both The Irvine Co. and Hyatt are anticipating that the rate will increase with the recently completed expansion of the airport.

“With its strategic location and quality design and amenities, this hotel is a first-class business hotel,” Hyatt President Darryl Hartley-Leonard said in a statement.

Cody Plott, a Hyatt regional vice president, said the new Hyatt will fit in nicely with their other properties in Orange County. They include the Hyatt Newporter in Newport Beach, the Hyatt Edgewater in Seal Beach, the Hyatt Lodge in Laguna Hills and the Hyatt Regency Alicante in Garden Grove.