Tim Scoble may not be a name you recognise, but, if the 51-year-old hotelier's plans to redevelop one of London's ugliest buildings come to fruition, he may yet come to be seen as something of a hero by Londoners, tourists and history buffs alike.

Mr Scoble is the chief executive of Guoman Hotels, formerly Thistle Hotels, and, as part of a revamp of the group's hotel properties, he is looking at ways of improving the exterior of The Tower, widely seen as a carbuncle on one of the world's most historic sites. Although the 801-room hotel is highly profitable, even the Guoman boss admits that it is a “concrete bunker ... It's an eyesore.

“Given that it's next to a World Heritage Site and in one of the most-photographed areas of London, clearly it's in everyone's interests, including us, to have a property that fits in with the character of the location.”

He is considering several schemes, including one that would involve turning part of the building into luxury flats, although changing the exterior will be a priority. “With modern building materials, construction and design, there are many ways in which to enhance a building. There's nothing we'd rather do more than have The Tower as a shining example of an updated property by the 2012 Olympics.”

The revamp of The Tower is part of a planned investment programme of between £120million and £130million of its London hotels over the next three to four years as Mr Scoble seeks to turn Guoman into a stylish, international brand. By the time it is finished, the company will have six Guomans in the capital, with 3,500 rooms, including The Royal Horseguards and the Thistles at Victoria, Marble Arch and Charing Cross.

The conversion of the Thistle Marble Arch might seem an odd move, given that that the company already has a Guoman 200 metres away —The Cumberland — but Mr Scoble argues that the individuality and different styles of the properties will ensure that there is little or no overlap.

The Guoman name — Mandarin Chinese for “international gateway” — derives from the company's Asian ownership. It is controlled by the Singapore-listed Guoco Leisure, which itself forms part of the sprawling business empire of Quek Leng Chan, the Malaysian billionaire.

The group has had something of a chequered history since it was acquired by Mr Quek in 1991. It was floated in 1996, but he took it private again in 2003 after a share collapse on the back of dire trading. At flotation, there were more than 100 Thistles of varying size and quality, but today it is a more focused business, with 16 owned and leased hotels in London and 22 managed hotels in the regions.

Mr Scoble says that when he took the reins in January 2006 he found a company lacking a coherent strategy. While the upmarket Guoman brand will help him to extract higher room rates from its London flagships, a £60million refurbishment of 20 regional hotels by CIT, the property company that owns the freeholds, should also help to rejuvenate the tired Thistle brand.

“When I joined this company, it was trading at a loss, which isn't a good place to be, particularly given the London assets it owned. I've put a new group of people together focused around two things: just doing the sensible things that professional hotel companies do; and developing a strategy to take the business into growth.”

As well as developing its existing assets, Mr Scoble believes that the present financial turmoil and the inevitable decline in the hotel trade will throw up acquisition opportunities and enable the group to fill gaps in its portfolio in key British cities. He is also using his investors' connections to develop the Guoman brand in Asia. There is a Guoman in Malaysia, soon to be refurbished, and properties will open in Beijing and Shanghai in 2010. Two properties are in the pipeline for Malaysia.

Yet it is The Tower project that gets his juices flowing. “I was visiting an office in Hong Kong a couple of years ago and there was a photo of Tower Bridge with our hotel airbrushed out. It has stayed with me ever since - and I'm determined to get it back on the map.”

CV

Age: 51

Qualifications: Chartered accountant

Employment: 2000-01 managing director of high street bars for Whitbread;

2001-03 managing director of Moat House Hotels UK;

2003-04 chief executive for Little Chef;

2005-06 consultant on private equity deals; January 2006 — chief executive officer of Guoman Hotels (previously known as Thistle)

Family: Divorced. with four sons: Ben, 23, Nick, 21, Joe, 14, and Dan, 11.

Lives in Wheatley, Oxfordshire

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