The Jurys Inn chain of 20 hotels in Ireland and the UK has been put up for sale. The company confirmed today an auction process commences this week.
It has been speculated the hotels, seven of which are in Ireland, could fetch up to €1 billion.
RTE understands that private equity houses have been invited to bid for the business.
A report in this morning's Daily Telegraph said the price being put on the chain was around €1 billion.
That would be significantly more than they were valued at when the Jurys Doyle Hotel Group was taken private just over a year ago.
The move is the latest in a series of hotel sell offs by the Doyle and Beatty families, who own the Jurys Doyle Group under the name JDH Acquisitions.
Earlier this year the Montrose Hotel in Dublin was sold for €40m to the owners of Superquinn, while the Burlington Hotel is also up for sale with a price tag of around €300m.
Last year, the group sold its landmark hotels in Ballsbridge to developer Sean Dunne for €380m.
The Jurys Inn chain, comprising three and four star hotels, are being sold as a going concern with a select number of international interests invited to particiapte in an auction for the business.
There are currently plans to develop a further nine Jurys Inns while the eventual size of the chain could be as large as 70 hotels.
The auction of Jurys Inns is being organised by Crownway Investments and advisers Merril Lynch. Crownway is run by John Gallagher the husband of Bernie Gallager, a daugher of the hotel group's founder PV Doyle.
JDH plans to use part of the money raised from the sale of the Inns to reinvest in its remaining hotels which include the Westbury in Dublin's city centre.
