In Ali County's Gêrzê County, situated at an altitude exceeding 4,700 meters, a newly opened Hanting hotel operates reliably. Despite the thin air and harsh climate, the hotel maintains 24-hour hot water and stable oxygen supply—a challenge not only to the extreme environment but also a high-pressure test of Hanting's capabilities as a "national hotel" system. This demonstrates a key objective: where there are Chinese people, there should be a Hanting; it aims to eliminate the need to "make do" during travel, ensuring that no matter the location, travelers can find familiar comfort and reassurance. By 2025, Hanting Hotels had become the world's largest hotel brand by number of properties, exceeding 4,000 locations. It was also in this year that Xue Guanbing transitioned from frontline operations to lead the National Business Unit, taking on the strategic mission of fully realizing the vision of being the "far relative and close neighbor for 1.4 billion nationals." However, after achieving this scale, what is next for Hanting? During a nearly two-hour conversation with Xue Guanbing, the answer became clear. He spoke less about numbers and scale, instead repeatedly emphasizing "certainty," "sense of happiness," and "system capabilities." Within Hanting's strategic blueprint, the key question is no longer the quantity of new hotels, but rather: Who can open hotels in places others cannot or will not? "Hanting is continuously penetrating untapped markets, ensuring its presence across the vast expanse of the country. This means that whether on the snowy plateaus, in remote border towns, or in any extreme environment, Hanting strives to maintain consistent standards and quality through its systematized capabilities," Xue Guanbing stated. In his view, Hanting's ultimate goal is not merely to be a hotel brand, but to become "the infrastructure of the hotel industry"—a replicable, scalable, and evolving operational system.

"Always on the Frontline": From Hanting Hotel Manager to CEO of the National Business Unit When Xue Guanbing joined H World Group in 2008, the group operated just over 130 Hanting hotels. Hailing from Shaanxi province, his initial roles were at the front desk, in guest rooms, and in the kitchen of a Hanting hotel in Beijing, starting work as early as 6 a.m. He refers to this as H World Group's "frontline culture": "Back when we were hotel managers, we had a motto: 'Don't go home until the hotel is fully booked,'" Xue Guanbing recalled. "Managers would think together, 'A full city of bookings is what true full occupancy means.' That mindset embodied a hands-on, on-the-ground culture and a pioneering spirit of daring to fight and persevere." Over seventeen years, Xue Guanbing rose from hotel manager to CEO of the National Business Unit, while Hanting's understanding of "national needs" underwent critical evolution. Initially, Hanting's core promise was "a good sleep, a good shower, and good internet." Today, "good internet" has become a baseline expectation due to technological普及, while "a good breakfast" has risen as a core demand. Hanting's "One City, One Flavor" initiative not only provides hot breakfasts but also incorporates local specialties, allowing business travelers to experience localized taste memories within the standardized environment of a chain hotel. A deeper change involves redefining the essence of a "national hotel." For Xue Guanbing, the essential need for guests is not simply low price, but providing sufficient certainty, safety, and a sense of happiness at an affordable price. For investors, it represents a stable, predictable investment product. Hanting boasts many partners who have been franchisees for over ten years, which itself testifies to the product's value. "What Hanting aims to do is become the infrastructure of the hotel industry," Xue Guanbing summarized. Supporting this goal is H World Group's systematic "talent development" mechanism, which elevates organizational capacity building to a strategic level: clear strategic objectives, an enterprising "Dragon-Horse Spirit" cultural core, and a "battlefield as classroom" practical philosophy collectively shape employees who "resonate on the same frequency" as the group. "First, there must be clear strategic direction at a high level, so everyone knows where the organization is headed, and individual efforts have a clear focus. Second, there is the enterprising 'Dragon-Horse Spirit' as H World's core ethos; for instance, the cultural immersion of 'don't go home until full' naturally filters for like-minded partners. Finally, the practical philosophy ensures that the most capable fighters are closest to the frontline, accumulating experience in real operations and honing talent in genuinely complex environments," Xue Guanbing added.

Bringing Hanting to the Foot of Mount Everest: Replicating Standardized Capability to Every Corner This journey has not been easy for H World Group. The hotel industry is never short of competitors, with competition being particularly fierce in first- and second-tier cities. In 2022, H World launched the "Ten Thousand Lights" plan, clearly identifying the lower-tier market as its strategic core. However, compared to first- and second-tier cities, lower-tier markets are vaster and more complex. The greatest challenge for H World's team became how to replicate standardized capabilities into every corner. If the early Hanting was about validating a model in mature markets, the "organizational下沉" beginning in 2021 constituted an extreme stress test of the national hotel model. When Xue Guanbing was transferred to lead the Western China company, he faced a vast and unfamiliar territory—Tibet, Yunnan, Xinjiang—characterized by sparse populations and complex environments. Yet he saw a deeper opportunity: "Where there are Chinese people, there should be a Hanting." In early 2022, while traveling on China's famous National Highway 318 landscape route, Xue Guanbing encountered inconsistent accommodation experiences. "I thought then, if there were a Hanting at every key node along this route, what a sense of security it would bring to travelers?" Within two years, he and H World's franchisees turned this idea into reality. Hanting's lights now shine at every major stop along Highway 318, including the Hanting Ali Gêrzê hotel at 4,700 meters above sea level. Pioneering in extreme environments forced a restructuring of the entire operational system, with the core logic being: push decision-making authority, resources, and capabilities forward to where "the sound of gunfire can be heard." Localization of talent became the primary breakthrough. The Western China company shifted from nationwide recruitment to selecting talent locally, expanding cooperation with local educational institutions from a handful to over 40, even establishing "Tibetan language classes" and "Uyghur language classes" to cultivate localized service teams. In Yuepuhu County, Xinjiang, a couple working at a Hanting hotel—the wife as a housekeeping supervisor, the husband in engineering—managed to buy an apartment in the county town with their combined monthly income of just over 10,000 yuan. They brought their child from the countryside to live with them and enrolled them in the county's best kindergarten, marking the beginning of their happy life. "This is just one small story," Xue Guanbing said. "In every Hanting hotel under H World, similar stories of happiness are unfolding." Localization of the supply chain was key to reducing costs and improving efficiency. H World used the Sichuan-Chongqing region as a hub to push resources and production下沉; it achieved service下沉 in Gansu, Qinghai, and Xinjiang by establishing operational supply transit warehouses and supply chain service centers. Surprisingly, H World even invited high-quality suppliers from Eastern and Northern China to establish a presence in the west, providing free office and accommodation support in exchange for reduced construction costs and shorter project timelines resulting from their localized services. Localization of marketing broke down brand barriers. Within the Western China company, different brands formed a united sales force, creating a local "iron sales army" to provide immediate流量 support for newly opened hotels. The "Western China Campaign" validated a model: through organizational下沉, system empowerment, and local adaptation, Hanting's standardized system can operate not only in bustling metropolises but also take root in remote and challenging areas of the country while maintaining consistent quality. This "campaign" provided Hanting with replicable experience and confidence for entering even broader下沉 markets.

Reaching the top of the global hotel brand rankings by scale is a milestone for Hanting, but Xue Guanbing looks further: "A true 'global first' should evolve from being 'first in scale' to being 'first in users' minds,' transforming from a 'functionally satisfying' brand into an 'emotionally connecting' brand."

Beyond Accommodation: The Efficiency Revolution of the National Hotel and China's Answer for "Good but Not Expensive" Similarly, for the company, Hanting's pursuit has long shifted from quantity to quality, even aiming to benefit every participant in the hotel ecosystem. The underlying support enabling this leap is a continuous "efficiency revolution." "'Good but not expensive' is not a slogan; it is the inevitable result of an efficiency revolution and the widespread benefits of technology," Xue Guanbing explained, describing Hanting's core competitiveness. "It is the extremely high quality-price ratio brought about by极致 efficiency." Technology-driven operational efficiencies are evident everywhere: "Self-service H-Zhanggui" kiosks enable "10-second check-in," while robot delivery and "0-second check-out" have become standard. These digital applications reduce reliance on manpower and lower operating costs, and Xue Guanbing emphasizes that "the value saved is ultimately returned to the users." A more profound change comes from "cost restructuring" driven by an industrial mindset. The upgrade to Hanting 4.0 follows the core logic of "building hotels the way we build cars." Through principles of intelligence, modularization, and assembly, Hanting applies industrial production methods to hotel construction. From the lobby's "Pony Series" functional cabinets—incorporating delivery stations, tea stations, coffee stations, cleaning stations, and charging stations—to guest room furniture, extensive use is made of factory-pre fabricated, on-site assembled modules. This not only ensures product consistency nationwide but also, through bulk purchasing and design optimization, reduces the cost per room while enhancing aesthetics and functionality. The Hanting 4.0 design also incorporates unique "emotional functions." Guest room lighting uses a 3000K natural color temperature to avoid glare; the curved headboard design symbolizes a "warm embrace"; cloud-shaped lighting elements evoke childhood memories. Public areas are transformed into "urban stations": self-service convenience stores, charging stations, public restrooms open to all, and even providing hot water and rest stops for city service workers like traffic police and sanitation workers during bad weather... "We are not just providing travelers with a comfortable stay environment," Xue Guanbing explained. "Hanting aims to become the 'far relative and close neighbor for 1.4 billion nationals,' a warm life partner embedded within communities."

Xue Guanbing's outlook for the Chinese hotel industry over the next five years is clear and firm: consolidation of existing stock, continued increase in chainization rates, accelerated penetration of下沉 markets, AI technology driving a new wave of transformation, and cross-border integration meeting the demands of younger consumers. Hanting's response strategy is already defined: within these certain trends, leveraging the system capabilities validated in the Western China company, the continuously evolving product strength, and the deeply ingrained pursuit of efficiency, it will light the lamps of the national hotel in more places "where there are Chinese people." Regarding products, Hanting will continue refining details with a geek spirit; in marketing, it will make the brand image more personified through a series of national IP initiatives; in community culture building, it is committed to making Hanting a "warm life partner." From Ali at 4,700 meters to Mohe in the far north of China; from the first hotel near Kunshan railway station in 2005 to becoming the world's largest by scale in 2025, Hanting's expansion map marks not just commercial growth but the fulfillment of a promise. When a traveler sees that familiar facade in a distant land, what they receive is not just a good night's sleep, but a sense of reassurance brought by the efficiency revolution in China's hotel industry—the experience of standardized, secure accommodation at an affordable price.