Patrick McCann
Overall ranking: 63
Hoteliers ranking: 18
Snapshot
Patrick McCann is the chief executive of the Jurys Doyle Group, a Dublin-based hotel operator with 34 hotels in major cities in Ireland, the UK and the USA. It targets the budget-plus, the four-star and the five-star sectors with its Jurys and Jurys Inn brands, and also has five individually-named four-and five-star properties in Dublin and Washington DC.
Career guide
McCann, who was born in County Sligo, started his career with Ireland's Ryan Hotels (now known as Gresham Hotels).
In 1989, he moved to the Jurys Hotel Group as general manager of the Jurys Ballsbridge Hotel and Towers hotel in Dublin. In 1994 he became a director of the company and, in May 2000, was promoted to chief executive of what had become the Jurys Doyle Group following the takeover of the Doyle Hotel Group the year before.
What we think
McCann has seen and overseen the rapid expansion of Ireland's oldest hotel group, which can trace its roots back to 1893. But by 1993, when it launched the three-star, budget-plus Jurys Inn brand that was to drive much of its future growth, it still had just five hotels.
Since 2000, McCann has significantly reshaped the company to create a strong player (even in hard times) with bags of potential for further growth. In the past four years, he has disposed of six hotels and opened 11 in order to exit the three-star mid-market and concentrate on the more lucrative budget and top-end sectors.
The group now has a good spread between Ireland (14 hotels), the UK (16) and the USA (four).
Most of the hotels are company owned, but future additions are likely to be a mix of owned and leased properties. New-builds have dominated the openings over the past three years, and this trend is set to continue.
With money relatively easy to secure in Ireland, Jurys Doyle says it has no plans to go private like so many of its peers in recent years. McCann raised £52m in April 2004 to fuel future expansion.
The plan is to open around three or four new hotels a year, and 2005 will see new Jurys Inns launched in Southampton and Nottingham, along with a four-star Jurys at Dublin's Croke Park sports stadium and conference centre.
By the end of 2005, McCann says Jurys will have added almost 2,400 new bedrooms since the start of 2004.
