(FORTUNE Magazine) – Is a Hyatt Hotels IPO on the horizon? That's what many Wall Street watchers are asking in the wake of the estimated $900 million settlement in early January between the Pritzker clan and two young Hyatt heirs who claimed that their dad unfairly cut them out of the family fortune. That and other feuds about how to split up the family empire have stymied Hyatt for the past several years. But now expect to see business dealings trump drama. Rivals like Hilton, with more than 2,200 hotels, and the 2,800-strong Marriott have expanded aggressively since the late '90s, so Hyatt, with only 212 hotels, has plenty of catching up to do. Thomas Pritzker, Hyatt's CEO and the eldest son of founder Jay Pritzker, ended 2004 by acquiring AmeriSuites and has begun reorganizing the company by uniting its domestic and international hotels under the name Global Hyatt. All the maneuvering--and the fact that several family members are said to want out of the business--has led to the IPO talk. (A public offering would let relatives easily unload their share of the estimated $15 billion empire.) But with a gold-plated name, Hyatt would have an easy time raising capital outside the public markets and might not want the hassle of regular shareholders. After all, there's nothing that old-fashioned heirs like less than answering to the public. -- Barney Gimbel