The two specialist printing firms entered liquidation on 13 August 2024, with notices posted to Companies House on 22 August. Both had passed resolutions to wind up their affairs voluntarily on 13 August.

Both DecTek and Big Bang will be liquidated under the stewardship of insolvency practitioners Dean Collins and Brendan Doyle of Doyle Davies in Cardiff.

Problems at the firms became apparent over the summer, when Printweek understands director Mike Beese attempted to pull together a rescue package for the firms. The precise nature of the challenges is unclear, with neither the liquidators or Beese wishing to make a comment at the time of writing. Both Big Bang and DecTek phone lines rang out.

The liquidators’ statement of affairs shows no clear picture for any end result: while Dectek records a book value of £1.4m in plant and equipment, liquidators were unable to estimate anticipated realisations against £700,000 in fixed charges. HMRC was owed just shy of £225,000.

Discounting any realisations from plant and machinery as ‘uncertain’, the firm’s estimated total deficiency stands at £1.6m.

The change in fortunes for the Pontypridd companies has come suddenly. In January 2024, Dectek had just bought its ninth Titanium reel-to-reel digital label cutter, and Big Bang had merely months before installed a Konica Minolta BizHub AccurioLabel 320 label press and a Moll Compact Gluer to launch it into the labels market and clear a finishing bottleneck.

Big Bang, which printed with two Canon imagePress toner engines, had invested over £2m in kit since its formation in 2021. It turned over around £2.8m in 2023, and had hoped to grow to £4m by the end of 2024.

DecTek, founded in 2003 as a specialist printer of domed resin labels, employed 24 as of its 2023 accounts.