"It is not your parents Ritz Carlton," says company spokeswoman Landry Fuller. "After hundreds of interviews in our research phase, we took dead aim on the two high tech centers, and our guests will see we've built a world class, tech-friendly hotel in an extraordinary setting."

The resort proper consists of a main lodge and three adjacent guest houses, a 16,000-sfspa and 17,000 sf of meeting space, plus two on-property golf courses and Navio, its signature restaurant. Two thirds of the rooms have ocean views, and each room has three phones, high-speed Internet access, and an in-room safe large enough to fit a laptop computer. A "technology butler" is available to answer computer-related questions.

The site is owned and was developed by a joint venture of Vestar-Athens, a partnership of Vestar Development and The Athens Group, both of Phoenix, and Yarmouth Capital Partners II, a fund managed by Atlanta's Lend Lease Real Estate Investments Inc. The project's architect is Hill Glazier Architects of Palo Alto.

Fuller says advance bookings are healthy, including one five-night stay this year in which one firm will occupy 250 of the hotel's 261 rooms. Still, some hotel industry insiders are considering the $100 million resort a gamble.

"On this project, they are pioneers," says hotel consultant Rick Swig of RSBA Associates in San Francisco. "As happens with pioneers, some make it big, as the Ritz did with their Laguna Niguel project," he says. "On the other hand, with the premium they are charging--rooms start at $350 a night and top out at $1575 a night--they will have some interesting challenges to overcome," including Half Moon Bay's iffy weather patterns, particularly in summer, and a location that is, in Swig's words, "not terribly convenient to get to and as yet unproven as a destination resort."

Those two factors--and the fact that its high-tech corporate clientele are hurting right now--could make it harder for the Ritz to reach stabilized occupancy and price levels, a painful process which can take a new hotel three to four years even in an established market. "With their aggressive pricing strategy and luxury mentality, it is going to depend on how fast they can go from a business mix of primarily group and corporate bookings with a lesser amount of individual business to the reverse," adds Swig. "They did it at Laguna Niguel, but you have to understand (that) sometimes pioneers end up on the side of the trail with arrows in their backs."

One thing the Ritz won't have to overcome is San Mateo County's vibrant hotel market, which according to hotel appraiser Susan Ernst is rock solid. "Our research shows that San Mateo currently has a nice edge over San Francisco at 82.7% average occupancy in its hotels, a healthy 8% increase over a year ago," says Ernst, "and though the convention hotels near San Francisco Airport get most of the action, my guess is that with the Ritz name and management style, the beauty of the site, and the fact that it automatically owns the luxury niche, the Ritz has a winner on its hands."