An Engineering Research and Development Framework for the Challenges Faced by the Hotel Industry: Hong Kong Case Study

Abstract

Most hotels in a commercialized city are now struggling to satisfy the rapid and dynamic changes of customers’ requirements. New concepts and approaches for design and development and operation of hotel systems are necessary to cope with these challenges, to maintain market competitiveness, and to secure long-term prosperity. The article examines the present customer requirements and future hotel industry development in a rapidly changing city. The article attempts to formulate strategies to deal with challenges from the utilization of advanced information and systems engineering perspective. An engineering research and development (R&D) framework composed of a customer-oriented approach, a manufacturing system-life-cycle, and artificial intelligence employed in computer integrated manufacturing and agile manufacturing is proposed. Each important aspect of the R&D framework is discussed in detail: the current problems of hotel design and operating concepts, the engineering principles of resolving encountered problems, and methods of facing the challenges.