Four of the 10-strong group of investors assembled by David Drumm, Anglo Irish’s former chief executive, are: Gerry Gannon, Joe O’Reilly, Seamus Ross and Jerry Conlan. Either they or some of their companies now owe several billion to Anglo. All four declined to comment last week.
Gannon co-owns the K Club, which hosted the 2006 Ryder Cup, with Michael Smurfit. He is the founder of Gannon Homes and owns a large amount of land in north and south Dublin.
O’Reilly is best known for developing the €1 billion Dundrum Shopping Centre. His company, Castlethorn, plans to build a €1.2 billion new town in Adamstown, west Dublin. He also plans a mixed-use development on O’Connell Street in Dublin.
Longford-born Ross runs Menolly Homes, the country’s biggest housebuilder. He owns Dunboyne Castle in Co Meath and recently ended a dispute over profits made on the development of houses in the K Club. He lost millions when the International Securities Trading Corporation (ISTC), a finance company set up by Tiernan O’Mahony, a former Anglo executive, came close to collapsing.
Conlan is the least well-known of the four. He sold 400 acres of land he co-owned in Naas, Co Kildare, known as Millennium Park, for €340m. He used much of the proceeds to found the Mount Carmel Medical Group which owns a maternity hospital in Rathfarnham, south Dublin. Mount Carmel has been appointed by the Health Service Executive to build private hospitals on the grounds of public hospitals as part of the co-location strategy.