Communisis is expected to finalise the sale of Howitts to an MBO team today or by the beginning of next week at the latest.


The commercial print arm of Nottingham-based Howitts was put up for sale in August following the transfer of direct mail work from the business to Communisis Chorleys and Broadprint operations.


The group has also announced a strategic alliance with IBM, which will offer state-of-the-art customer relationship management (CRM) solutions for customers.


Communisis chief executive David Jones said the partnership was "the first in a series of alliances that will be put together to deliver CRM".


The group will be targeting key clients in the financial sector. "Over the last few years financial institutions have been refining their databases to get to their clients better," Jones explained. "The delivery system for CRM belongs at the printer, but they can only do it if they can manage the data. Most of what we do now is about data."
With CRM we can offer a higher level of personalisation to increase the conversion rate - we're talking about 4, 5, or 6% and beyond - and make it cost-efficient for customers," Jones added.
Nick Marsden, european director of marketing for IBM Printing Systems, said IBM had identified Communisis as "being unique in its market".
Communisis will use IBM's database management software and consultancy services, and a six-strong team (three from Communisis and three from IBM) will tackle implementation.