The UGC cinema on Parnell Street is to undergo a £10 million (€12.7m) revamp, which will see it expand into the failed Sheridan Imax theatre and double its number of cinema screens to 18.

The two-phase project will involve a complete redesign of the interior, which is to be extended to 150,000 sq ft with 3,840 cinema seats, as well as a proposed facelift that UGC say will address the building's current status as "a bit lost on the streetscape".

The cinema complex will also get a new bar, restaurant and retail units to replace existing ones and those that have gone out of operation.

A group of 26 investors owns the premises, for which French cinema group UGC pays an annual rent of around £1 million (€1.27m) per annum.

UGC's property manager Adrian Swain says the aim is to make the city centre multiplex, "a more exciting place to go" .

The company received planning permission for the internal alterations in March and work is expected to start early in the new year.

"We are going to gut the existing building and reassess the look and layout of the foyer. Planning permission for the exterior element of the redevelopment has yet to be finalised but we are going to integrate the existing building with the former Imax cinema building so that they appear as one."

The entrance to the new foyer will be located to the left of the existing one and the mall will be redeveloped to create "more activity", according to Ed Douglas of Douglas Newman Good.

He says they will be looking for a food operator "of the TGI Fridays or Eddie Rockets ilk" as well as a publican to run a "young and trendy" bar in place of the existing Shooters bar. They are also considering the possibility of a bowling alley, says Douglas.

Currently two of the units off the foyer, Flix and Strike Four, are closed down. The cinema was originally developed by Sheridan, which still runs the cinema's amusement arcade, Century City, and is in negotiations with operators to run the former Strike Four food outlet.

This Friday Sheridan is scheduled to open an Imax cinema in the Odyssey in Belfast - a £100 million sterling sports arena, science park and cinema complex which it funded to the tune of £24 million. But the Imax experience never took off in Dublin due to "a combination of factors" says Simon Healy .

"As a concept it was relatively unknown in Dublin although it was strong in parts of Europe and in the US. We tried to market it but it didn't capture the public's imagination."

UGC currently occupies around 80,000 sq ft, and will expand into the Sheridan Imax area, which has been unoccupied since it closed last year.

UGC - which stands for Union Generale Cinematographique - took over the Parnell Street cinema from Virgin in October 1999 when it paid £215 million sterling for the purchase of 34 multiplex cinemas.

UGC has over 90 cinemas across France, Belgium, Italy, Spain and the UK.