Venoco Inc. founder Tim Marquez has taken the publicly traded oil company private after buying up the remaining stock shares as part of a merger agreement.

The oil company, headquartered in Denver with operations on the South Coast, announced the change this week.

A merger between Venoco, Marquez, Denver Parent Corp. and Denver Merger Sub sealed the deal after shareholders allowed the sale.

Before the merger, Marquez owned 50.3 percent of shares, while the public controlled 49.7 percent.

Venoco was merged with Denver Merger Sub, with Venoco as the surviving entity. Venoco, as a wholly owned subsidiary of DPC, will keep the same officers.

Beyond financial backing, Venoco will see few changes, according to Mike Edwards, Venoco vice president of corporate and investor relations.

Marquez will remain the board executive chairman and Ed O’Donnell will continue to serve as chief executive officer.

“Our operations don’t change,” Edwards said Thursday. “Tim Marquez didn’t feel like the public markets saw the same value as he did in the company. The extra burden of being public didn’t have any benefit.”

Marquez founded Venoco in 1992, and put in a request to buy up the rest of public shares last year.

Part of the financing Marquez got to close the go-private transaction came from a $315 million second lien term loan and a $100 million drawn on a new $175 million revolving credit facility that has $156 million in initial commitments. For the balance, Marquez raised $60 million of private financing at his “Holdco” level, Edwards said.

— Noozhawk staff writer Gina Potthoff can be reached at gpotthoff@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.