As managing director of his family's Leeds-based company Petty's, he was one of the first people in the country to introduce colour web-offset printing.

Having joined the family company in Leeds after finishing college, he took over as managing director in the 1950s.

He eventually sold Petty's to British Printing Company in 1972, but stayed at the business when it became part of media mogul Robert Maxwell's British Printing & Communications Corporation.

His final job was working on the Daily Mirror newspaper, where he was integral in making it one of the first national titles to feature colour.

While working under Maxwell, he was sent to talk to the managers of Leeds-based business Waddingtons, with whom he was a close friend, to help broker a hostile bid to buy the copmany.

However, Petty defied the highly-feared Maxwell and remained loyal to his friends, meaning that Maxwell did not manage to secure a deal over the company, which is still independent today.

Petty's right-hand man in his bid to bring colour web-offset to the UK, and also one of his closest friends, Martin Nicholson, said of his passing: "Ken was certainly one of the pioneers of print and I am happy to have been with him at the start of the web-offset phase. He was a true gentleman and there weren't many of them in the industry."

He leaves behind his wife Elizabeth, children John, Anne and Bridget, as well as five grandchildren.

His funeral will be held at St John the Baptist Church, Adel, Leeds, tomorrow (1 October) at 11.30am.