Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the H World Group conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there'll be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you will need to press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, to Mr. Jason Chen, Investor Relations Director. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Morning, and good evening, everyone. Thanks for joining us today. Welcome to H World Group's 2022 second quarter and first half earnings conference call. Joining us today is our founder and chairman, Mr. JI Q i, our CEO, Mr. Jin Hui , our president, Ms. Xinxin Liu, our CFO, Ms. Chen Hui , our Deputy CFO, Ms. Ye Fei , and our CEO of International Business, Ms. He Jihong . Following their prepared remarks, management will be available to answer your questions. Before we continue, please note that the discussion today will include forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provision of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. As such, our results may be materially different from the views expressed today. A number of potential risks and uncertainties are outlined in our public filings with the SEC.
H World Group does not undertake any obligations to update any forward-looking statements except as required in applicable laws. On the call today, we will also mention adjusted financial measures during the discussion of our performance. Reconciliation of those measures to comparable GAAP information can be found in our earnings release that was distributed yesterday. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. The webcast of this conference call, as well as supplementary slides presentation, is available on H World Group's website at ir.hworld.com. With that, now I will turn the call over to Mr. Ji Qi. Mr. Ji, please.
Good morning, and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Second quarter of 2022 has been both a turbulent and a promising period for our business. In China, large-scale outbreak of COVID, especially in major cities like Shanghai, posed significant challenges to our hotel operations. We took all necessary measures to protect our customers and employees in a collaborative development in carrying out preventive procedures against the COVID spread. We provided the support to our franchisees to help them overcome the difficulties as well. In order to maintain healthy cash flow positions in this disruptive period, we further conducted cost reductions in a very disciplined way, including streamlining of our headquarters. On the other hand, our European business has experienced a very healthy recovery. Pent-up demand for travel needed to grow both in ADR and occupancy.
Second quarter RevPAR almost recovered to similar levels for the same period in 2019. The recovery trend continues in the third quarter. In the past several years, COVID as well as geopolitical conflicts has brought many disruptions and challenges to our business. Facing the uncertainties of external environment, we have been focusing on strengthening our core competence and building a resilient organization which is able to ride through different economic cycles. We continue to focus on sustainable quality growth, ensuring quality, consistency, and improvement for our existing hotels and upcoming new openings are essential for our business. Therefore, we continue to remove inferior hotels, including sub-brands, from our hotel network. China, our core market, is the single largest scale market with a vast potential. We will further increase our market penetration, especially in lower-tier cities.
In order to be close to the local market and become more agile in our decision-making process, we have established six regional headquarters. Each headquarters is equipped with a very experienced development and operations team, which will create a better understanding of the market as well as access to our customers, franchisees, and employees. We are confident that such a restructuring of our business management will allow us to accelerate our quality growth and provide more opportunities for our business partners in the local markets. With that, I will turn the call to Hui Jin to discuss our recent business development in detail. Please.
Thank you, Qi Ji. As usual, let me firstly review our China business RevPAR recovery for the quarter. Please turn to page 3. Due to the impact of COVID, our RevPAR recovery reached the bottom in April at only 53% of 2019 level. However, since then, our RevPAR recovery started to improve gradually in later months. RevPAR in July recovered to 90% of 2019 level.
Putting the consideration of our RevPAR in Beijing and Shanghai only recovered to the range of 50%-60% of 2019 level in July, other cities and provinces shows further RevPAR recovery with over 95% of 2019 level. As we mentioned in our first quarter earnings conference call, we started to reinforce cost control measures for our China operations. In fact, we had some achievements during the quarter. Please turn to page 4. On the rental expenses front, we achieved CNY 60 million rental reduction in the second quarter. For overhead cost optimization in our headquarter, we reduced roughly 10% of headcounts in second quarter compared to the year beginning.
We also mentioned previously that we would continuously center on customers, franchisees, and employees to build our capabilities to rise through the economic cycle. Therefore, in the second quarter, we provided totally CNY 120 million fee waivers for our franchisees to help them to overcome the difficulties. At the same time, in order to insist on implementing our sustainable quality growth strategy, we also adjusted and upgraded our organizational structure and continued to remove inferior hotels from our existing networks. Hotel business is a very localized business .
As we are further penetrating into more and more less penetrated market, we started to realize the importance of localized management capability as well as the essential to continued upgrading our organizational structure. Please turn to page 5. In the fourth quarter last year, we established South China regional headquarter and West China regional headquarter. These two regional offices are developing and performing well since then. Therefore, we applied this experiences to the whole country and established six regional headquarters this year. We changed our organizational structure from previous brand based to regional based management and operation for our economic and midscale brands. There are three key purpose of making such adjustments. Firstly, a localized team could have better understanding on local customers, franchisees, preference and a faster reaction to the local market changes.
Secondly, a localized regional office could achieve more synergy in terms of operation, sales and the marketing and the management, higher operational efficiency and a shorter decision-making process. Lastly, it would help us to accelerate our lower tier cities penetration and the development in previously weak regions to achieve our long term sustainable quality growth target.
在品牌发展上，我们也坚持经营发展战略不动摇。在未来一到两年内，加速退出经济型软品牌酒店市场。因为经过过去三年的市场实践，结合我们对未来中国市场消费升级的大趋势的综合判断，我们更坚定了这样的一个决定。请大家翻到第六页。大家看到过去几个季度，我们对低质量的经济型软品牌管道酒店进行了逐步的清理。未来一到两年，低质量的存量酒店的调整也会持续地推进。
In terms of brand and products development, we also insist on sustainable growth strategy based on our own experiences and the practice in the last 3 years. Together with our judgment on the general trends of future consumption upgrading in the China market, we decided to accelerate exit from economic soft brand hotel market in next 1 or 2 years. Please turn to page 6. As you may noticed that in previous few quarters, we had already cleaned up many inferior economic soft brand hotel pipelines. In the next 1 or 2 years, we would continuously remove inferior hotels, including soft brand hotels, from our existing hotel networks to further improve our quality.
请大家翻到第七页。低线城市持续渗透。截止六月三十号，低线城市酒店数量在营酒店和管道酒店占比分别为37%和56%。第二季度新签约的561家酒店中，有58%来自于低线城市。二季度城市覆盖数量也进一步增加到1,132个城市。
Please turn to page 7. Our lower-tier cities penetration continuously progressing. As of June 30th, 37% of hotels in operation and 56% of hotels in pipeline are contributed from lower-tier cities. In the second quarter, 58% of total 561 new signings are from lower-tier cities as well. City coverage also increased to 1,130 cities in the second quarter.
请大家翻到第八页。中高档和高档市场发展也在有序地推进。从组织结构来看，与经济型中档的区域化为主导的管理模式相区别，中高档和高档品牌还是以品牌事业部为主导的管理模式，因为需要品牌事业部依据各自品牌战略来把控不同品牌独有的运营调性、产品研发和客户体验。从品牌发展来看，中高端品牌目前已经进入到收获期。截至六月末，中高端品牌在中国的在营酒店数量达到了445家，管道酒店229家。漫心品牌开出了第一百家漫心酒店。同时我们也用定位翻牌市场的美伦品牌，进一步挖掘市场上的存量翻牌机会。而高档酒店的发展，我觉得还需要进一步的时间的培育。受到房地产行业的影响，来自于新建物业的新签约将会受到进一步的影响。我们也将重点放在与地方政府合作，以及寻求高端市场的存量翻牌的机会。花间堂及旗下花间系列的品牌已经准备开拓更多的休闲度假市场。
Please turn to page eight. Our upper midscale and upscale hotel segments are also progressing steadily. Unlike economy and midscale segments, we keep our organizational structure unchanged for these two segments. We still use brand-based management and operational structure for these two segments, as each brand in the segments should have its unique and differentiated strategy on brand positioning, product innovation, as well as customer experience. In terms of the future development, we believe our upper midscale segment is ready to harvest. By the end of June, we have total 445 upper midscale hotels in operation and 229 in pipelines in China. Our leisure brand Manxin achieved its hundredth hotel opening milestone recently. At the same time, we are going to leverage more on our Madison brands to further seek the conversion opportunity in the existing market.
Moving to the upscale segment. Given the recent weak property market, undeniably, our new signings of newly built upscale hotels are heavily, negatively impacted. However, alternatively, we are also focusing more on finding local government corporations and conversion opportunities in the markets to support the future development. Lastly, our Blossom House and the recently introduced Blossom House series brands are also well-recognized and accepted by the market. It is ready to further tap into the booming domestic leisure market. DH solid business recovery continues in the second quarter. Please turn to page 9. We saw DH's RevPAR recovery improve month-over-month. It recovered to 99% and 100% in May and June, and July RevPAR had already exceed 2019 level with recovery rate of 103%.
More importantly, given recent solid recovery, we are now expecting DH's recurring EBITDA to turn positive for the full year of 2022. Please turn to page 10. In terms of the business recovery in the second quarter, its blended RevPAR recovered to 93% of 2019 level, mainly driven by roughly 10% increase in ADR, and the trend continues in the third quarter. The recovery was mainly driven by leisure traveling and also supported by pan-European corporate group demand. However, although the recent business recovery was quite solid, we continuously conduct strict cost control for DH, which mainly includes headquarter overhead cost reduction, operational efficiency improvements, CapEx control, as well as energy efficiency improvements and the cost controls.
Lastly, for longer term development, we continuously enhance DH's organizational capability through integration of H World digital and distribution capability for efficiency and the direct channel performance. Relaunch H Rewards membership program for better digital guest experiences, and capture the limited service market share in Europe by further investing and developing Intercity and Zleep brands. With that, I will turn the call to Fei Ye to discuss our second quarter operational and financial performance.
Thank you, Jin Hui. Good morning or good evening to everyone, wherever you are. Let's move on to our operational and financial review for the second quarter of 2022. As shown on slide 12, our hotel rooms expanded by 12% in the second quarter to 774,000, compared with the second quarter of 2021 of 692,000. Excluding DH, Legacy Huazhu's hotel rooms expanded by 12% year-over-year to roughly 749,000 in this quarter. For our hotel turnover in the second quarter, our total hotel turnover declined by 10% year-over-year to CNY 11.8 billion in this quarter.
It was mainly due to the large scale outbreak of Omicron variant since late March in China, but partially offset by our continuous network expansion in China and the strong business recovery of our European business. Excluding DH, hotel turnover of Legacy Huazhu declined by 19% year-over-year to CNY 10.3 billion in this quarter. Turn to page 13. Legacy Huazhu blended RevPAR for Q2 declined by 31% compared to 2019 due to the impact of Omicron outbreak since mid-March. The ADR in Q2 2022 was down by 7.8% compared to 2019 at CNY 218, while occupancy in Q2 was 22 percentage points lower than 2019.
If excluding the impact of hotel under requisition, RevPAR would have. If including the impact, RevPAR would have recovered to 75% of 2019 level. Turn to page 14. Legacy DH business recovery further accelerated in the second quarter. Our Legacy DH blended RevPAR for Q2 grew by 233% to EUR 66 compared with Q2 2021, although still behind the 2019 level. The occupancy improved by 35 percentage points compared with Q2 2021, and the ADR improved by 35% to EUR 110, which actually exceeded the 2019 level by 10%. Please see our financial results on slide 15.
Total revenue declined by 5.7% year-over-year to CNY 3.4 billion in Q2, mainly dragged by the 26%, by the almost 27% of Legacy Huazhu's revenue decline in Q2 to CNY 2.5 billion. Legacy DH recorded a strong revenue growth of 311% year-over-year to CNY 921 million. Revenue was in line with our previous guidance at the lower bottom. Decline of Legacy Huazhu revenue was mainly due to the large scale of Omicron variant outbreak since March. Breaking down the revenue of Q2, leased and owned revenue increased by 3.5% year-over-year to CNY 2.4 billion. Excluding DH, leased and owned revenue of Legacy Huazhu was declined by 28.7% year-over-year to CNY 1.5 billion.
Total revenue from managed and franchised hotels declined by 25% to CNY 945 million, mainly dragged by the decline of Legacy Huazhu's business, but offset by the 100% year-over-year growth of Legacy DH. The 26.7 year-over-year decline of revenue from managed and franchised hotels, Legacy Huazhu, also includes roughly CNY 200 million impact from management fee waiver provided to franchisees and also less CRS contribution because the channel change in this quarter. Due to the strong recovery of Legacy DH business, the managed and franchised revenue contribution temporarily shrank to 27.9% in Q2 2022, compared with 35% in Q2 2021 at group level.
For Legacy Huazhu, despite further expanding hotel networks with asset-light model, our management fee waiver provided to franchisees and lower CRS fee contributions in managed and franchised revenue, actually reduced the contribution of the managed and franchised business contribution. Now let's move on to the cost and profitability section on slide 16. In Q2, the reported operating income was CNY 8 million, compared to a positive CNY 629 million last year, and a loss of CNY 708 million a quarter before. The large decline of operating income year-over-year was mainly due to weaker China business performance. Excluding DH, the Legacy Huazhu's operating income in Q2, 2022 was CNY 21 million, compared to positive income CNY 763 million last year, and a negative CNY 416 million a quarter ago.
The hotel operating cost for 2022 second quarter was CNY 3 billion, increased by 8.5% year-over-year. For Legacy Huazhu, it recorded CNY 2.2 billion hotel operating cost, indicating a 1.5% year-over-year decline or a 3.9% decline on a Q-over-Q basis. Besides the variable cost saving associated with lower occupancy, a major driver is also roughly CNY 60 million rental cost reduction, which is gonna continue in the next few quarters. For Legacy DH, it recorded CNY 804 million hotel operating cost, indicating a 49% year-over-year growth. The increase was mainly due to the increase of variable cost associated with business recovery, such as labor, F&B, consumables, variable rents, and et cetera.
Other factors also including the impairment cost of terminated lease agreement in this quarter and the less rental reduction compared to the same quarter last year. Our pre-opening cost increased by 93% year-over-year to CNY 31 million in Q2, mainly due to more limited service lease and owned hotel under construction during this quarter in China. However, the absolute dollar amount of pre-opening cost remains low as our future expansion of upscale hotels will mainly use asset-light model, which we've mentioned in previous quarters as well. Our SG&A in Q2 declined by 7.8% year-over-year and 12.7% quarter-on-quarter to CNY 510 million, driven by the decrease in the Legacy Huazhu, but offset by the increase in Legacy DH. Excluding DH, the SG&A for Legacy Huazhu declined by 21% year-over-year to CNY 332 million.
The decline was mainly attributable to the cost control measures by streamlining headcounts and expenses in headquarters offices, as well as less selling expenses, along with weak China business performance. On the other hand, DH selling expenses increased. It's actually aligned with business recovery. Other operating income in Q2 decreased by 57% year-over-year to CNY 153 million, because there's much less subsidy received from German government compared to the same quarter last year. Turning to page seventeen. Our adjusted EBITDA was CNY 53 million in Q2 compared to CNY 1 billion a year ago. DH EBITDA turned positive in Q2 2022 to CNY 30 million compared to a loss of 72 million in 2021, driven by the accelerated business recovery. Excluding DH, Legacy Huazhu recorded an adjusted EBITDA of CNY 23 million compared to CNY 1.1 billion in Q1 2021, Q1.
This is mainly due to the impact of large scale Omicron virus outbreak in this quarter. Also there were roughly CNY 400 million foreign exchange loss brought by the asset depreciation, which are denominated in euro, including our shares in Accor, our loans to DH and et cetera. However, this adjustment is temporary. In Q2 2022, we recorded adjusted net loss of CNY 84 million, narrowed from a loss of CNY 662 million a quarter ago. Excluding DH, Legacy Huazhu recorded adjusted net loss of 32 million, narrowed from a loss of CNY 339 million a quarter ago. Coming to the cash position, our net debt reduced to CNY 5.7 billion by the end of Q2 from CNY 6 billion last quarter.
It was mainly due to the cash generated from operation in this quarter. Our cash balance was CNY 4.7 billion and the unutilized bank facility was CNY 3 billion. Given the COVID impact remains uncertain in the foreseeable future, we remain cautious on CapEx and OpEx spending to reserve cash. In addition, we have successfully refinanced our upcoming syndication loan with a total outstanding amount of EUR 340 million. Also, we are prepared to meet the possible redemption of 2017 convertible bond later this year. Turn to page 20 on guidance. In the third quarter of 2022, Huazhu expect revenue to grow 13%-17% compared to the third quarter of 2021, or to grow 5%-9% if excluding DH, on the assumption that there's no large-scale Omicron outbreak again, as we mentioned before.
With that, let's open up for Q&A. Thank you.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from the line of Billy Ng from Bank of America. Your line is open.
Hi, good morning. Basically just want to know whether the recovery trend that we've seen in we have seen in July that continue in August and September. What kind of blended RevPAR assumption that we were using when we provided the revenue guidance growth for this quarter? Thanks.
Hi, Billy, this is Faye. To your question, we estimate roughly like 85% blended RevPAR recovery compared to 2019 for third quarter.
Thanks. For August and September, do you think that will be better than July in terms of recovery or worse?
Actually, I think the August is actually slightly better than 85%. It's like 88%, if we talk about the recovery compared to 2019.
谢谢。第二个问题我想问就是，看到第二季度的时候，我们开店的数目其实还是有260，然后新增签约的也有400多。我想问的就是，随着这个疫情慢慢控制住了，在第三季度我们有没有看到开店跟新签约的情况有反弹、有改善呢？
我是金辉，我来回答这个问题。确实在第二季度，录得了我们应该是五百多家门店的签约的速度，一部分来源于一季度积压的签约的这个状况。事实上，疫情以后呢，我们可以看到，疫情的影响以及中国经济的一些影响都在持续的展现。我们看到了在中国主要城市的签约速度其实是有所减缓，特别在中国的省会一二线城市，受到疫情反复的这样的一个影响。但是三季度可能我们也随着疫情的政策的中国第九版的改善，流动性的这个适度的放宽，使得我们开业速度得到了一些的保证，就是工程的营建受到的影响要比之前一二季度要明显减少。所以应该是这样一个结论，就是整个疫情和经济的影响对我们未来的发展，我们是肯定会有影响，这个影响主要是持续会在一二线城市的影响。那开店我们正在保证我们这个营建的和工程的恢复。谢谢。
For the second quarter, we actually signed up roughly over 500 new hotels during the quarter, but some of them are from the previous quarters' backlogs. In fact, you know, given the impacts of the COVID as well as the economic conditions, a lot of cities, especially for those major cities, we are seeing some slowdown undeniably. It will have some negative impacts on the new signings for the near future. Entering the third quarter, given the prevention policy has gradually, you know, lifted or improved, our new openings as well as construction for the hotels have less impacted from the COVID.
Putting all those things together with the COVID and economic conditions, especially for those tier one, tier two cities, definitely, the impact are gonna last for a while. Thank you.
Thank you.
Next question, please.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Simon Cheung from Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.
谢谢你们的 presentation。我有两个问题，第一个就是，你们刚才讲到是你会加快推出那个软品牌那个市场。我记得几个季度之前你们也说过这个问题，可是，另外一方面，你们的其他竞争对手其实是有加快这方面的。想请教一下你，你们觉得如果看长期来讲的话，软品牌最大的问题是什么样呢？So my first question is in relation to the acceleration of the exceeding of the soft brand hotel.
Having seen, you know, some of the other competitors, actually, accelerating, you know, the positioning of these, you know, market segments. I'm wondering whether, you know, what is the strong rationale or reasoning behind accelerating and exiting the market and what is the major challenge that they can foresee in the next one or two years? Thank you.
谢谢。我来回答这个问题。我想在座很多投资人都很关注我们这样一个经营的战略调整。我想我们也关注到华住和其他企业采用了不同的市场发展战略，我想这也是不同企业对市场和未来自身战略的一些深度的思考。华住要构建可持续的高质量的发展，是我们经营增长的一个战略的核心。我想在过去几个季度，季琦也好，或者我们管理团队一直在释放给我们投资人这样坚定的华住的战略调整。基于几个很明确的思考：第一呢，我们认为中国的，从我们的市场实践和反过来讲，中国的消费升级其实在各个低线市场也是在持续的发展。老百姓、国民追求有品质的生活和美好生活是他们的主要趋势。第二呢，我认为对于低线市场和软品牌，政府的各种监管和合规的需求也在持续的监管加强中。所以我们也是基于这样的考虑。第三呢，也当然来自于我们对高质量的国民市场增长的信心，我们也在过去几个季度给大家也可以看到，我们无论在汉庭、你好、Ibis这些构建质量的国民增长趋势的信心。所以我想基于以上三个原因，我们坚定地采取了这样的一个退出，加快退出在软品牌经营型的市场，是基于我们对自己未来可持续的增长战略的思考和决定。谢谢。
We think there's a lot of investors are curious on this parts. We also notice that one of our peers, we are using very different, you know, thinking and developing strategies compared to our peers. As our management team as well as our chairman emphasize several times in the previous few quarters that we gonna insist on implementing our sustainable quality growth strategy under these conditions. That's makes the key decisions. There are three reasons behind.
One, in China, our judgment on the future trends of the consumption that actually especially in the lower tier cities we are seeing and observing that the up-consumption upgrading are the major trends in the near future. People in those cities are requiring a high quality and a better life, high quality products and enjoy the better life is the major trends in the future as well.
Secondly, we are also seeing that the governments are actually putting more strict compliance requirements and the regulation on those inferior products, not only hotels, but also other industry as well. We think our strategy trends are aligned with the government being also on the quality growth in the future. Thirdly, it's our high confidence in terms of our high quality economic hotel product development, including HanTing, Ibis, as well as other major brands as well. That's why we make our decision that we gonna exit from the softer brand economic segments in the next one or two years.
好的，谢谢。另外一个问题想问的就是你们刚才讲到，那个区域分公司那个问题，想请教一下，我记得，你上次做那个cost saving做的很不错，那，现在做这个区域公司其实对你的成本以及，那个收入，我们应该怎么去想这个问题呢？如果从可能未来几个季度去看的话。My second question is in relation to the set up of the six regional headquarters. The company obviously were very successful in terms of you know controlling the costs in the last quarter. I'm wondering, you know, what would the implications of this, you know, new regional office set up to both the costs as well as the revenue in the coming quarters. Thank you.
我是金辉，我来回答这个问题。我们在整个针对有限服务的国民市场和有限服务的中端市场采用了区域化的管理。我想这个很容易理解，因为更贴近客户，随着我们下沉市场的这样的一个管理半径越来越远，我们希望我们的高效的运营组织更能贴近我们的消费者，更贴近我们加盟商，同时来构建本地化的人才供应链，本地化的营销资源，来推进我们这个可持续的经营的这个下沉的战略。这个目的大家应该是非常明确的。在整个组织转型当中，我们非常非常关注我们的成本的这个问题，我们其实是把总部的平台的很多的管理资源和人才往区域去下沉。我们下沉不光是我们的这个发展的下沉，更是我们整个管理资源的下沉。所以我们希望在整个转型当中，一方面是严格把控总人力成本，总人力资本的投资。第二类就是把整个在平台的管理资源和管理人员往区域公司去下沉。所以这个过程应该讲在严格的成本管控的措施下，我们采取了整个比较大的组织结构的调整。
As you may know, we actually are moving the economic and the midscale limited service brands to the regional office and a change in organizational structure from previous brand-based to the regional-based. It is very obvious that it will be much closer to our local customers, franchisees, and it becomes higher efficiency in terms of the management and operation, especially in the lower tier cities. It will enable us to build up a more comprehensive, localized supply chain, sales, creating some synergies in terms of the sales and marketing strategies as well.
We definitely have our focus on the cost control. In fact, despite we are building six regional offices, but actually we have assigned some of the people and talents from our previous headquarters to the regional offices. Because we are not only assign people from the development front, but also the management front as well. In terms of the overall cost control measures, so we can continuously control our total cost, especially under these conditions. Thank you.
好的，谢谢王理事，谢谢。
那个，这两个问题挺好的，我想做一些补充啊。我是季琦。
Thank you.
第一个问题就是关于软品牌的问题。软品牌，当时这个OYO进中国花了很多钱，声势很大。作为中国在这个酒店服务品牌里面的这个主导的酒店集团之一，我们必须也应该做一些思考。我们采取了防御性的措施，我们做了软品牌，不管是怡莱还是你好，当时是我们的一个防，叫什么，防备，防备的一个动作。经过了——Jason，你先翻译。
Okay. Thank you, these two are very good questions. This is Qi Ji. In regards to the soft brand, probably everyone knows that back a few years ago, there was another brand called OYO, very aggressively entered in China, and becomes one of the largest hotel groups at that year. It makes our thinking about their strategy, and we also needs to react on their aggressiveness. That's why we also use a very defensive strategy to protect their competitions.
经过一段时间实践以后，我们发现这些中小酒店，实际上他们可能需要的不是管理，甚至不是营销，他可能最根本的一些客户体验都做不好，比如说硬件产品啊，服务水平啊，PMS系统啊，这个内部的一些技术架构啊，就是我觉得我们华住也不愿意，也实际上也没有能力为这么多广大的酒店提供服务，我们也不愿意把我们的品牌去用来这么多我们不太吻合的，不符合我们华住这个叫，就是稳健战略的这些小酒店上。而是通过一些技术支持，比如说我们盟广的这些很多一系列啊，盟广的很多技术，技术输出啊，甚至包括供应链，通过这样的方式对这些中小酒店提供支持，提供就是服务输出，改变我们的策略。这是我们最根本的一个非常大的一个转变。那么你们会看到我们过去几个季度，我也来了几个季度，一两年之内我们的开店数没有那么的，就是漂亮，或者没有那么的好像那个优美，但是我觉得没关系，利用这个疫情，我们正好把该调整的调整掉。我们的开店数不是我们的目标，我们是要把公司最核心的能力、盈利能力，包括抗风险的能力和面对将来机会，抓住机会的能力来提高，这是华住要做的事。这是我想对软品牌做一个补充。谢谢Jason。翻译。
Okay, over the last several years experience and practice, we actually realized that those very small scale hotels, they actually don't need the management, not the management, not the PMS, not the technology at all. We are also not willing to sacrifice our brand to helping them or to putting them in our networks. In the future, we could have some alternatives, such as we will empower them by using our technology capability, our supply chain capability to help them to operate in the industry.
In the near future, probably in next one or two years, in terms of the growth openings, our group's new openings might not be that bright or outstanding or large scale, that is, we mentioned several times that we emphasize on the quality growth and by using the opportunity of the COVID, so we actually need to clean up all those inferior hotels and make some necessary adjustments internally as well. In fact, the new openings are not only our key target, or in the long term, our key target in the long term should be our capability to overcome the risk and our capability to be sustainable growth.
其他酒店集团他们还在做软品牌，包括OYO在印度做得也是不错的。我相信到达山顶的路不只一条，成功的道路也不只一条，他们有他们根据自己的特点选择自己的道路。我觉得我，我作为我来说不做任何评价，我也希望他们能够，他们的方式能够成功。Jason。
Okay, yeah, other companies are still expanding the soft brand strategy, as well as OYO is also doing very well in India, because every company has their own strategy. I don't give more comments on this.
关于组织结构的下沉，这个别人觉得，哇，是不是一下子搞好多公司出来，然后招很多人呢？实际上华住，如果说你，我基本上美国我也看过了，欧洲我也看过了，例如说南美我都基本上都跑过一圈了。在中国的这个市场，实际上已经就是，就是这个市场的这个广度和深度已经大到其实，就是已经大到必须去贴近那些，呃，就中国的这个，比如西藏和上海，中国的这个，比如说陕西、甘肃这些地方，跟那个江苏和浙江，它很多地方不太一样。我们是个统一大市场，但是整个的这个一些特点还是不一样，还是不一样，所以我们必须要，必须要深入到那些地方去，才能进行那个，就是准确的布点，包括人员的招聘，包括合作伙伴的沟通。过去呢，是都是总部模式。
我们也是这样，就是一种总部思维，那我们的总部思维是没有道理的，这个行业非常的地域化，所以我们觉得也就是有点像我们把这种总部原装化，就今天我们的六个大区的老大，就是我们的CEO了，实际上都是我们从上海或者从总部派出去的干部，都是兼任的。未来的话就是包括很多干部，也在当地的原来的架构里面提拔出来，甄选出来，形成我们的区域总部，不是招很多人，然后养很多人，这个他们自己对人工的控制、成本的控制很严格的。组织下沉是华住下一步要为上万家、一万到两万家酒店必须做的事情。中国的市场太大了，中国的地域太辽阔，中国的各地的人文环境实际上是多彩多姿，我们必须用这样的结构来完成我们的下沉战。谢谢。
Okay, in terms of our organizational restructuring, people might be curious whether we are going to hire a lot of people or increase the headcounts massively. In fact, we are not. I have studied a lot in terms of the United States market, Europe market as well as the South America market. Actually comparing to China is big enough. Actually each provinces and regions have very different cultures and very differentiated, such as if you compare Shanghai to Tibet or Shaanxi to Jiangsu provinces, those areas are very much different. Therefore, in terms of further penetrating the local market, we have to move forward of our organizational structure to be closer to the local market.
In fact, there's a lot of, you know, people such as the CEO of those six regional headquarters are all assigned from our headquarters, and we are having more of talents will be promoted from headquarters to be assigned to the regional offices. So each of the regional offices will have a very strict cost control. They won't be hiring too much of the people. Actually putting all together, in terms of reaching our target to have 10,000-20,000 hotels in total in the future, it is very necessary for us to have those regional offices to further support to achieve this target in the future. Next question, please.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Our next question comes from the line of Sujie Lin from CICC. Sujie Lin, your line is open.
好的，谢谢管理层。恭喜咱们获得一个比较显著的控费的效果。我有一个关于中高端的问题，我们之前提到中高端市场还有很大的空间嘛，也是说到了一个收获的季节。那么公司这几年做了哪些准备来实现这一块的加速拓展呢？还有就是，一般来说，越往上这个顾客会越重视这个会员权益，然后在会员权益的设计上，咱们是怎么思考的？So I have a question regarding mid to upscale markets.
We mentioned before, there's still potential for China's mid- to upscale markets. What preparations have we made in recent years in order to accelerate expansions in this segment in the future? Generally, customers of mid- to upscale hotels' member benefits. How do we design our member benefits? Thank you.
好的，我来回答这个问题。刚才那个在我汇报里面，我跟大家、股东和分析师都交流了我们这个在中高端的一些发展，我们确实在过去几年做了大量的准备工作，以及不断的积累，因为从过去有限服务追求效率和成本领先战略的这样的一个组织和团队能力上面，转型到以品牌和客户体验为导向的这样的一个新的市场，我们确实迈过了很多的这样的一个能力的边界，也突破了过去的舒适区。所以总体而言，在两个维度上面我们做了积极的准备。
第一个就是在整个以品牌战略为导向的产品研发和构建上面，我们在水晶，在美居，在橙纪，在漫心，在过去几年应该讲在这些产品上的研发和整个的品牌战略的迭代，应该讲取得了非常显著的进步。第二个就是在于围绕客户体验为导向的整个运营和管理的整个组织架构和人才培养上面，我们也做了大量的储备。我们现在两个、三个事业单元，水晶漫心事业单元，橙纪美居事业单元，以及美伦事业单元，我们积极地都在构建围绕中高端这样的一个服务和体验为导向的人才的整个的培养，和整个意识的调整，这个也在积极地推进中。所以取得的这些进步都是来源于，我认为在品牌的积累和人才的不断的这样的完善上面带来的一些成果。
当然我相信我们还有很多的工作可以可持续地往下做，我们依然非常坚信，在中高端，中国随着消费升级，在核心城市的这样的市场还是非常具有这些广阔市场，以及像美伦在中高端的存量更新和翻牌上面也有非常多的这个建树，我认为这个是非常非常好的一个问题，也是我们正在努力去突破的这样一个华住的能力的边界。第二，对于关于华住会在中高端的服务和体验上面的进一步完善，我们确实做了一些思考，我们一方面呢，要考虑的整个华住会体验的一致性，这有些核心的体验，就像Amazon Prime这些，一些非常标准、非常强记忆的客户的体验点。
同时呢，我们利用中高端酒店门店场景的一些服务体验，我们展开了一些本地化的这样的一个，就是基于门店酒店场景的会员服务体验，比如下午茶，比如讲那个更多的这样的一个基于中高端业务场景的这样的一个服务体验的设计，我想各个事业单元也在做了相应的这个工作。当然，我们正在对于中高端和高端以及度假市场的会员的权益和体验，正在做完整的思考和设计，以及结合DH在欧洲的一些推广和客户的反馈，我想很快我们在未来的可能半年左右，我们会对整个中高端和高端以及度假市场的这个客户的这样的一个会员的体验，我们会就有进一步的迭代和升级。好吧，谢谢。
Okay. In terms of our midscale and upscale, upper midscale development, as I mentioned in my prepared remarks previously, we keep progressing steadily. In fact, we have been preparing for this segment for last few years. Huazhu was very good at in terms of the operating for the limited service, especially in the economy and the midscale segments before. We are good at in terms of the cost control, high efficiency, but for the upper midscale, it's gonna change from those to the branding and the customer experiences. That's why we spent a few years to experimenting and discussing internally and adjusting our strategy accordingly. In fact, for this particular segment, we have several points.
First, in regard to the products, continuous product and branding upgrade. We have totally 6 brands, including the Crystal Orange, Mercure, IntercityHotel, and Madison and Manxin and Novotel as well, to have a very differentiated customer experiences. Also in terms of the operation and organization structures, we have 3 key BUs, business units. The Crystal Orange and the Manxin are the first business units, and IntercityHotel and the Mercure are the second business units. The Madison business units are using to catch the conversion opportunity in the existing market. For our membership program and also the member privileges, especially for the upper midscale segment, we do have some internal discussions.
First of all, we will keep the core experiences unchanged, just like Amazon Prime, the members. There is a very strong key core customer experience for each of the membership programs. But also in terms of the upper midscale, that we also leverage on each of the brands and the hotels to provide different privileges and customer experiences in addition to the core privileges. For example, the afternoon tea, it really depends on each of the brands and the hotels itself. In probably next half a year or six months, we will also have more adjustments and discussion and thinking on the membership programs together with the Deutsche Hospitality. Yes. Thank you.
It's very clear. Thank you.
Thank you. That concludes the Q&A session. At this time, I'd like to turn the call back over to Mr. Jason Chen, Investor Relations Director, for closing remarks.
Sorry. Thank you everyone for taking your time with us today, and we look forward to connect with you again in upcoming quarter. Thank you. Bye-bye.
This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.