All Nippon Airways Co. may sell more than half of its hotel business to InterContinental Hotels Group PLC of Britain, ANA sources said Wednesday.

The move to sell a controlling stake in ANA Hotels & Resorts Co. effectively amounts to handing over the group's hotel operations to the British chain, which runs Holiday Inn Hotels and Crowne Plaza Resort Hotels, the sources said.

The tieup would help ANA reduce responsibility for its biggest noncore business, although it plans to keep the exclusive ANA Hotel brand, the sources said.