Profile: Mr Sean Quinn, the man whose multifaceted business looks poised to take over Barlo plc, began his career as an agricultural contractor in his native Co Fermanagh.
In the early 1970s, he began quarrying and selling sand and gravel in the same region, building up the business slowly from a one-truck operation to the point where, in the 1980s, he was in a position to take on the big gun in Irish construction materials, CRH.
He began manufacturing cement on the Fermanagh side of the Cavan-Fermanagh border.
While it was widely predicted that the operation would fail to compete with the CRH-owned Irish Cement, the business prospered and laid the foundation for the eclectic mix of ventures that is the Quinn Group.
He followed this up in the 1990s with a glass manufacturing operation, and then spent €79 million on developing a new cement plant in Cavan, which opened in 2000.
The same year, cement also brought the low-profile Quinn Group one of its few tastes of controversy when it emerged that the company had contributed €38,000 to a local group objecting to Belfast-based Lagan Cement's plans for a plant at Kinnegad, Co Westmeath.
Along the way he opened the 159-room Slieve Russell Hotel in Cavan's lakeland, another venture that many people said was destined to fail.
It is still standing and shows no signs of closing. Quinn Group now has eight hotels, including the Prague Hilton in the Czech Republic's capital, and seven pubs.
In 1996, he took a tilt at what observers warned would be a real windmill - insurance.
The group launched Quinn Direct, which offered motor and household cover over the phone.
It worked and he followed it up four years later with Quinn Life, a life and pensions business that also operated over the telephone.
Last November, he bought 20 per cent of NCB Stockbrokers for an estimated €4 million, replacing Mr Dermot Desmond's IIU as its strategic investor.
It emerged at that time that Quinn Group would make a profit of €150 million in 2003 on a €650 million turnover. NCB is brokering the deal that may see him take over Barlo for €84 million. Last week it bought 14 per cent of the company on his behalf from Mr Desmond.
Mr Sean Quinn is 57 years old. He was raised on a small farm in Derrylin, Co Fermanagh. He played inter-county football for Fermanagh, but now lives in Ballyconnell, Co Cavan.
He is married to Patricia and has five children: Colette, Ciara, Sean, Aoife and Brenda.
