CEC's strategic partnership with the Ely Property Group will benefit from significant tax breaks, which allow investments in childcare facilities to be offset against income tax.
David Alexander, CEC chief executive, said the property company would look for suitable sites for nurseries, which would be run by CEC.
He said, 'The south of Ireland is short of childcare and we have always wanted to have a presence over there. It's a big growth area and the tax breaks make it financially very viable.'
He believed the timing was right because childcare is currently high on the political agenda and the Irish government is 'very supportive of childcare and will increasingly be so'.
The shortage of available childcare in Ireland was highlighted in a recent report compiled by senator Mary White of Fianna Fail, the governing party.
It concluded that between 70 and 80 per cent of childcare in the republic was organised informally through friends and relatives.
She said there was a need to create 60,000 extra childcare places over the next five years at a cost of (140m.
The Small Firms Association, which lobbies on behalf of small business, said childcare had to be a priority in next year's budget.
It pointed out that public investment in early childhood care and education was less than 0.2 per cent of gross domestic product, compared to an EU average of 0.5 per cent.
The Irish Labour Party has also weighed into the debate with a call for a new payment of (50 a week for every parent with a young child.
It is also demanding a free pre-school place for all three-year-olds and extended paid parental leave. The entire package would cost over (1.5bn.
Labour's spokeswoman on childcare, Kathleen O'Meara, said, 'Childcare doesn't come cheap and at the moment we have one of the lowest childcare spends in the world.
'We are a wealthy country now and we can afford this, and it's time that we recognised the contribution of parents, the contribution of childminders and the essential need to have in place a quality accessible system of early childhood care and education.'
