Smurfit teams up with McNamara to expand K Club

Dr Michael Smurfit has applied for planning permission to expand the K Club, in a €20 million project to be overseen by Bernard McNamara, the well-known developer.

Dr Smurfit has been working with Mr McNamara on how best to secure planning permission for 70 new bedrooms in the resort, alongside the existing 69-rooms in the 180-year-old Straffan House, for some months.

The investment will also include a new golf academy at the resort, which hosted the Ryder Cup in 2006.

Mr McNamara went bankrupt in Britain in late 2012 but has since returned to business. He has also worked for billionaire Denis O’Brien on completing an office block in Dublin as well as advising him on his other property interests overseas.

Dr Smurfit is also advising his friend Sean Mulryan on his re-emergence as an active developer in the UK and Ireland.

On target

The former chief executive of paper and packing giant the Jefferson Smurfit Group has remained on the board of Ballymore Properties as it repaid €1 billion to the National Asset Management Agency.

This puts it on target, the company has said, to repay all of its debts to Nama "at full par". Ballymore has hired Lazard and CBRE to raise almost €2.5 billion in a mixed use project in London called Nine Elms.

At the launch of the hardback of his autobiography A Life Worth Living in April, Dr Smurfit called Mr Mulryan, who was unable to attend, his "great friend."

Mr McNamara was among his guests, who also included Dermot Desmond, Denis O'Brien and Paddy McKillen. A paperback edition of Dr Smurfit's best-selling book which includes many insights into his life at the top of Irish business is due out next week.