East India Hotels that owns the Oberoi group of luxury hotel properties will terminate its marketing alliance and co-branding with Hilton International Co for the "Trident Hilton" brand in India, which will be known as simply Trident.

The company has intimated its decision to Hilton to terminate the arrangement with effect from 31 March 2008.

The company took the decision to terminate its alliance with Hilton as it wanted to develop the Trident brand independently in India, which felt it would not be able to do while also maintaining the Hilton alliance simultaneously.

A statement from the company attributes its chairman, P R S Oberoi as saying, "The outlook for our Trident brand in India is excellent. We are very confident that our Trident Hotels will continue to expand successfully. The Trident in Gurgaon has enjoyed a position of market leadership in Delhi from the day it opened.

"Our new 440 room Trident located at Bandra Kurla in Mumbai will open in 2008 and is expected to be a market leader in north Mumbai. We have new Trident hotel projects committed at the new International Airport in Bangalore and at the Hitech City, Hyderabad. We have a number of opportunities for new Trident hotels in other cities which we are pursuing."

East India Hotels and Hilton currently operate hotels in Gurgaon, Agra, Jaipur, Udaipur, Bhubaneshwar, Chennai and Cochin under the "Trident Hilton" brand, which will be known as "Trident" hotels effective 1 April 2008.

The Hilton Towers in Mumbai will also be rebranded as "Trident Towers" from that date.

Hilton is reported to be evaluating a joint venture with the DLF Group, for both the Hilton and the Hilton Garden Inn (lower end, or budget) hotels.