The sale of ParkRite, the Republic's largest car-park operators, has been completed for a figure believed to be approaching £10 million (€12.7 million).

The company was sold by Irish Life & Permanent to a private venture led by Mr Derek Quinlan and Mr Alan McCormack.

Neither man was available for comment yesterday.

Both have experience in the property investment business and Mr McCormack's family have a private investment company.

Industry sources said Mr Quinlan, who has an accountancy background, has been involved in putting together consortiums to buy tax-based properties.

The new owners already have extensive experience in managing car-parks.

These include car- parks at the IFSC, Arnotts, Christ Church, Temple Bar, the Parnell Centre and the car-park at Hynes Yard in Galway.

It is intended to merge these interests with ParkRite's business, using ParkRite as the operating company.

Following the deal, ParkRite will manage more than 7,000 car park spaces, mainly in Dublin.

It is not buying the physical infrastructure of any of the car-parks.

ParkRite is involved in both management contracts and leaseholding.

Last year it made pre-tax profits of £1.1 million (€1.4 million) up from £719,000 the previous year.

A spokesman for the new owners said last night that they were fully committed to developing ParkRite and would actively pursue opportunities to further expand the business, both in Dublin and elsewhere.

They have had a close business relationship with ParkRite for some years.

ParkRite has a lease on the new venture's car-park in the Parnell Centre and also has the management contract for its car-park in the Arnotts Centre.

ParkRite operates several carparks including those at the ILAC Centre, the Parnell Centre, Dawson Street and Drury Street.

Irish Life & Permanent announced plans to sell ParkRite last August.

It said then that given the group's focus on the retail financial services industry, the interests of ParkRite would be better served if it was owned by a company which was fully committed to the car-parking industry.