What is Asian hospitality? It’s a term that became popular in the early years of this century to categorise hotel chains from East Asia that were opening properties in the West and bringing higher and more gracious levels of service to their hotels.

When such chains as Mandarin Oriental and Peninsula (and, to a lesser extent Shangri La) opened luxury hotels in America and Europe their arrival was treated as a revolution because it showed up the take-it-or-leave-it attitudes of the big American chains.

The spread of the Asian chains made guests revise their expectations of luxury hotels. But there was a small irony at the centre of the Asian hospitality concept.

Within Asia it is such countries as Japan, Thailand and Indonesia (Bali in particular) that were regarded as epitomising grace and elegance in service. But almost all of the Asian chains were Chinese: Peninsula and Mandarin Oriental were from Hong Kong. Shangri La was owned by overseas Chinese. Of the newer luxury chains, Rosewood and Capella ended up in Chinese hands. (Usually the owners were either Overseas Chinese or companies from Singapore or Hong Kong.)

Few chains from the countries that were regarded as being centres of graceful hospitality ever made it out of Asia. And while the Chinese are brilliant they have no real reputation for being friendly (let alone hospitable) among their neighbouring countries.

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Thailand, which has some of the world’s best hotels, never really succeeded outside of Asia though, for a brief, misleading moment, it seemed as though such chains as Dusit would succeed globally.

That has finally begun to change.

Bangkok’s Minor group now has 640 hotels in over 60 countries and its luxury brand Anantara has a strong presence in Europe and the Middle East. And yet, despite the reputation of the Thais as being Asia’s great hoteliers Anantara has avoided being slotted into the Asian hospitality category.

Some of this may have to do with the man behind the group. Bill Heinecke is a legend in Thailand where his life story is the sort of saga that TV shows are made of.

Heinecke was born to American parents who lived all over Asia (his father was a diplomat and his mother was a journalist). The family moved to Thailand when Bill was 14 and he displayed an entrepreneurial streak early, succeeding in advertising before setting up Minor Holdings. The name came from his age: he was legally a minor (under 18) when he established the company.

He proved to be a........

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