Sir Rocco Forte.

In a party worthy of the ancients, at the grand opening of Forte plc's Hotel Eden in Rome, Margaret Thatcher mingled with mortals, including those painted gold and hired to pose virtually naked as living statues. The $16 million dollar Eden renovation is the latest in the Forte empire's flagship Exclusive Group, which serves as stomping grounds for the fantastically rich, and includes the George V in Paris, Sandy Lane in Barbados, and the Plaza Athenee in New York.

Though Forte has had a hotel in Sardinia since 1969, its newest bauble, a monument to luxury in the heart of the Italian capital, marks an exuberant homecoming for the Fortes - especially Sir Rocco's father, Lord Charles Forte, who immigrated from Italy to England and started a business with a Milk Bar in 1935, acquiring his first hotel in 1958.

What a difference a generation makes. Last November, London-based Forte acquired Paris-based Societes Des Hotels Meridien, a French hotel group, for 280 million pounds ($445.9 million). The purchase brought more than 100 properties into the company fold, while firmly establishing it outside Britain with a growing presence in the U.S. and the Pacific Rim. Forte now holds 1,600 properties in 60 countries, in urban centers such as Tokyo, Moscow, Frankfurt, Brussels, Bahrain, and Bangkok. That makes 50-year-old Sir Rocco, knighted for tourism last year by Queen Elizabeth, chairman and chief executive of the world's third-largest hotel group, behind Intercontinental/Sheraton and Marriott.

"There is increasing international competition for hotels," and a particularly hard-fought battle among the Big Three, says Greg Feehely, an analyst for Kleinwort Benson Securities in London. "But Meridien gives Forte a presence in Asian markets where supply will very soon outstrip demand. It's a big boon for them."

Forte knows elegance: Its signature hotels with their world-class chefs garnered two of the four three-star Michelin ratings in the U.K. But perhaps most significant, in an era when many hoteliers are narrowing their focus, concentrating on industry niches and national markets, Sir Rocco continues to stride with the giants, expanding a full-service, global chain with major holdings in the high-end, mid-range, and discount hotel segments. It's a tough row to hoe, given the slowdown in global tourism, soft real estate, and overcapacity. But by any yardstick, Forte has been a success. Pretax income surged 65 percent to [pounds]127 million on revenues of [pounds]1.79 billion.

Sir Rocco ascribes the hearty growth to hard-nosed bargaining, exacting acquisition criteria, and experience. "If you lust after hotels, you end up making a lot of mistakes and paying too much for them," says the CEO, who attended his first shareholders meeting at age 11.

"To some degree, that's a bit of a problem at the top end of the market. The late '80s boom meant people thought they could buy hotels and sell them six months later at a higher price. They didn't look at the returns they'd get out of the operation."

Partly to finance the Meridien acquisition, Sir Rocco cut loose non-strategic industrial and catering businesses in recent years, though Forte maintains a U.K. restaurant chain about half the size of its hotel business. He calculates it will take about a year to "digest" Meridien. Aside from enlarging Forte's scope, Meridien represents an aggressive thrust in the business-travel market, hammered in recent years by corporate layoffs, cost cutting, and teleconferencing. With some 26,000 rooms, however, Forte remains less than half the size of larger players in the arena. "We have quite a long way to go in terms of catching up," Sir Rocco says.

Blanket coverage and a No. 1 position in its home market recently prompted Forte to begin "branding" its U.K. properties. Exclusive Hotels represent top-of-the-line accommodations; Forte Crest Hotels cater to business guests, and are located in city centers and near airports; and Forte Travelodge is a budget chain. (Travelodge has 430 units in the U.S., represented in advertising by a sleepy bear in a nightcap.)

"Forte was the first hotel company to push brands down people's throats," says Charles Mason, an analyst at London's Barclays de Zoete Wedd. "But they had to do it. They had so many hotels, they were competing against themselves."

Like service businesses across the board, Forte leverages technology to boost productivity and enhance customer service. Forte's Fortres II reservation system went on line last December, linking 1,000 hotels to more than 400,000 travel agents around the world.

Information systems now flag hotel personnel about the tastes of luxury travelers: Conceivably, a first-time guest in Warsaw might be greeted with a bowl of pecans by the bed and goose-down pillows. But perhaps most important, beginning later this year, computer software will benchmark management on a broader array of service criteria, rather than on financial performance alone.

"Historically, we've told our managers, 'yes, we want better standards,'" Sir Rocco says. "But we also tell them that their bottom-line profits aren't right, or that they're not getting a sufficient gross profit on food." Systems-based benchmarking will force managers to balance more carefully the cost and amenities sides of the performance equation, he reckons.

In some respects, despite its 70,000 employees, Forte remains a family business with a minimum of tensione, led by its Oxford-educated, dispassionate patriarch. Sir Rocco's sister, The Hon. Olga Polizzi, is on the board and holds the title of managing director, building and design. Sir Rocco's father, Lord Charles, is Forte's president.

With more plates spinning worldwide, Sir Rocco finds himself spread increasingly thin. Nonetheless, he prides himself on being a field marshal, rather than a desk jockey. A seasoned marathon runner, he doesn't plan to curtail his globe-trotting.

"You sit in an office, and you tend to hear only about the things that are going wrong," he says. "You get out in the field, and you see people's enthusiasm, and you come back to the office refreshed. They say the general reviews the troops to motivate them. But the general also reviews the troops to motivate himself."

Profile: Sir Rocco Forte, chairman and chief executive, Forte plc.

Born: Bournemouth, Great Britain, January 1945.

Education: Modern languages, Pembroke College, Oxford.

Family: Wife, Lady Forte (Allai, married 1986). Children: Lydia, 7; Irene, 6; Charles, 3.

Boards: Savoy plc, British Tourist Authority. President: British Hospitality Authority. Member: Executive Committee of the World Travel and Tourism Council.

Peak experience: Knighted for tourism by Queen Elizabeth in December 1994. First person to be so honored.

Outside interests: Running marathons, including those raising money for charities.

Cultural involvements: Sir Rocco and his wife are trustees of the London Symphony Orchestra.