Hilton Worldwide
Type	Private
Industry	Hospitality, Hotels
Founded	Cisco, Texas (1919)
Founder(s)	Conrad Hilton
Headquarters	7930 Jones Branch Drive, Tysons Corner, Virginia, United States (McLean mailing address)
Number of locations	3,897[1]
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Christopher J. Nassetta, President and CEO
Revenue	$7.44 billion USD (2006)[2]
Employees	135,000+
Parent	Blackstone Group
Website	Hilton Worldwide

Hilton Worldwide (formerly, Hilton Hotels Corporation) is an American global hospitality company. It is owned by the Blackstone Group, a private equity firm. As of August 2012 Hilton brands encompass 3,897 hotels with over 642,000 rooms in 91 countries. Hilton is ranked as the 38th largest private company in the United States by Forbes.
The company owns, manages, and/or franchises a portfolio of brands which includes Waldorf Astoria Hotels and Resorts, Conrad Hotels& Resorts, Hilton Hotels & Resorts, Doubletree (DoubleTree by Hilton), Embassy Suites Hotels, Hilton Garden Inn, Hampton Inn and Hampton Inn & Suites, Homewood Suites by Hilton, Home2 Suites by Hilton and Hilton Grand Vacations.
It was founded by Conrad Hilton in Cisco, Texas and was headquartered in Beverly Hills, California from 1969 until 2009. The company moved to Tysons Corner, unincorporatedFairfax County, Virginia, near McLean in August 2009.

History
20th century
Conrad Hilton founded the original company in 1919 with the Mobley Hotel in Cisco, Texas.
The Hotels Statler Company was acquired in 1954 for $111,000,000 in what was then the world's most expensive real estate transaction.

Two Chains With One Name
The company spun off its international operations into a separately traded company on December 1, 1964, known as Hilton International Co.. It was acquired in 1967 by Trans World Corp., the holding company for Trans World Airlines. In 1986 it was sold to UAL Corp., the holding company for United Airlines, which became Allegis Corp. in an attempt to re-incarnate itself as a full-service travel company encompassing Westin Hotels and Hertz rental cars in addition to Hilton International and United Airlines. In 1987 after a corporate putsch, the renamed UAL Corp. sold Hilton International to Ladbroke Group plc, a British leisure and gambling company, which in May 1999 adopted the name Hilton Group plc.^[7]
The former Hilton Hotels Corporation headquarters in Beverly Hills

As a result, there were two separate, fully independent companies operating hotels under the Hilton name. Those Hilton Hotels outside the US were, until recentlystyled as Hilton International hotels. Because the two chains were contractually forbidden to operate hotels in the other's territory under the Hilton name, for many years hotels run by Hilton International in the US were called Vista International Hotels, while hotels operated by the American arm of Hilton outside the US were named Conrad Hotels.
In 1997, to minimize longtime consumer confusion, the American and British Hilton companies adopted a joint marketing agreement under which they shared the same logos, promoted each other's brands and maintained joint reservation systems. At that point, the Vista chain was phased out, while Conrad has been restyled as one of the luxury brands of Hilton (along with The Waldorf-Astoria Collection) and operates hotels within the US, as well as abroad.
In 1971, Hilton acquired International Leisure Company, including the Las Vegas Hilton and Flamingo Hilton.
In 1998, Hilton spun off its gaming operations into a separate, publicly held company called Park Place Entertainment (later Caesars Entertainment).
In 1999, Hilton acquired Promus Hotel Corporation, which included the Doubletree, Red Lion, Embassy Suites, Hampton Inn, & Homewood Suites brands.

21st century
In 2001, Hilton agreed to sell Red Lion to WestCoast Hospitality.
HHC was granted the naming rights to the George R. Brown Convention Center in late 2003. The Hilton Americas in Downtown Houston, Texas, is connected to the convention center.
On December 29, 2005, Hilton Hotels Corporation agreed to re-acquire the Hilton International chain from its British owner, Hilton Group plc, for GBP 3.3 billion (or $5.71 billion). As well as bringing the two Hilton companies back together as a single entity, this deal also included Hilton plc properties operating as Conrad Hotels, Scandic Hotels and LivingWell Health Clubs. On February 23, 2006, the deal closed, making Hilton Hotels the world's fifth largest hotel operator in number of rooms. Hilton Group PLC (headquartered in the UK) then renamed itself Ladbrokes plc.
On March 1, 2007, Scandic Hotels was sold to EQT V Group.
On July 3, 2007, Hilton Hotels Corp. agreed to an all-cash buyout from the Blackstone Group LP in a $26 billion (including debt) deal that would make Blackstone the world's largest hotel owner. The deal was the culmination of a year of on and off discussions with Blackstone.
The private equity group said it would combine cash from its real estate and corporate private equity funds to buy all outstanding Hilton shares for $47.50 each, a 32 percent premium over the July 3 closing stock price.
In October 2007, Christopher J. Nassetta was appointed President and Chief Executive Officer of Hilton.
In February 2009, Hilton Hotels Corp., announced that its headquarters were moving from Beverly Hills to Fairfax County, Virginia.
While Blackstone saw an opportunity to streamline the company and push Hilton's expansion overseas when Blackstone pursued Hilton in 2006 and 2007, the buyout saddled the company with $20 billion of debt just as the economy was turning down. The debt had very liberal terms, so there was no danger of default, but when travel slowed, the company suffered. In April 2010, Hilton and Blackstone restructured the debt. Blackstone invested a further $800 million of equity and the debt was reduced to $16 billion.
On September 12, 2013, Hilton filed plans for a $1.25 billion IPO.