Transactional printer Stralfors UK brought its Kent-based facilities under one roof… More than 250 jobs were put at risk at Transactis’s Liverpool-based site after it was sold to RR Donnelley… Paper and board merchant Doric Anderton saved 29 jobs when it acquired Crimped Paper Works… The Express Group’s move to Luton was unofficially confirmed by a local MP… Maurice Payne, founder of Theale, Reading-based Maurice Payne Colourprint, passed away… Etrinsic secured a multi-year contract with the National Grid worth more than £3m per annum… Granite Colour went into administration after the failure of its subsidiary business, The Good News Press and its assets and goodwill were subsequently bought by Park Communications… SV Two Digital went into liquidation owing more than £1m to creditors, with the loss of 12 jobs, less than six months after its litho sister company closed… MDA Creative went into administration after losing one of its biggest regular contracts… Adare completely revamped its Huddersfield site as part of a £3m investment in new machines… The company formerly known as Eurogloss Print Finishers closed its doors forever after going into liquidation… Printers raised concerns over impact of the VAT rise… RR Donnelley bought the business of former CDMS firm Transactis…

February 2011

Redesigned PrintWeek unveiled… Eclipse Colour and the 4DM Group merged in a deal that created one of the UK’s largest independent commercial print and direct mail businesses… Merseyside mailing house Character DPM Group (Character DPM) and its Stockport subsidiary Character Mailing Services (Mailing Services) went into administration, with 44 redundancies made…Southernprint confirmed that its finishing subsidiary Southern Binders would close as part of a restructure, which would lead to 101 staff being made redundant… Pre-press and inkjet equipment manufacturer Agfa Graphics acquired consumables supplier Litho Supplies in a below-the-radar deal… Heidelberg named Ricoh as its digital partner, entering a global distribution contract to sell and support the Japanese company’s Ricoh Pro C901 Graphic Arts Edition machine… JF Print, the former inplant of Haynes Publishing closed… Administrators called in at Alito Color Group, with the company citing the fallout from its purchase of TPF Group’s manufacturing arm as one of the reasons for its failure… Alderson Print Group sealed a "multimillion-pound" two-year contract with Microsoft to provide a range of marketing, direct mail and point-of-sale print… Label manufacturer Mercian Labels Group opened its newly refurbished factory after a £1m, three-year investment programme… Stephens & George (S&G) won a three-year contract with Haymarket Media Group to print the publisher’s weekly and monthly sheetfed B2B titles in a deal worth up to £4m… Journal Printing Company, the Scunthorpe-based magazine and journal printer, ceased trading with the loss of around 45 jobs…

March 2011

Thanet Press, the Margate-based commercial printer, ceased trading with all 85 staff made redundant… FMG, the north London-based pre-media business, sold a controlling stake in its business to a group of private equity investors led by India Value Fund Advisors (IVFA) for $20m (£12.5m)… Real Digital International (RDI) recorded its first pre-tax profit since it was founded in a £20m joint venture by former Olwen Direct Mail partners Andy Ruddle and Peter Rivett in 2005… DW Jones was sold out of administration to a company formed by previous directors… Walstead Investments bought the loss-making St Ives magazine arm, consisting of three production sites, for £20m, creating a wave of consolidation and capacity reduction across the sector… Canon unveiled the imagePress C7010 VPS series, the first fruits of its partnership with Océ since acquiring the Dutch manufacturer in 2010… CPI bought the UK’s first HP T350 in the second phase of its £22m pan-European spend… Printers slammed Unite for recommending its members push for 5.1% pay increases… HH Associates won a €15m (£12.9m) three-year pan-European print management contract with the global consumer brand manufacturer Sara Lee… Communisis sealed a £30m three-year print management contract to supply Everything Everywhere, the merged company of mobile providers T-Mobile and Orange…

April 2011

Office2office suffered a fall in pre-tax profit from £8.1m to £4.6m, figures it put down to a reduction in public sector work and adverse weather conditions… Folio (Bristol) managing director hit out after its bank froze its invoice discounting facility, forcing the company into administration… More than 200 Transactis staff at the company’s Whiston production site were put at risk of redundancy as part of the RR Donnelley TUPE transfer following the latter’s takeover… Pindar secured new banking facilities with HSBC of £13m from £10m, as it aimed to tackle a £26.7m pensions deficit and an operating loss of £993,000… Finishing house West Country Binders appointed a liquidator… Paragon Group suffered a pre-tax loss for its UK operation but fared better with its EU business, the latter helping the group to an operating profit of €2.2m, though this was still significantly lower than the previous year figure of €5.8m… Walstead Investments completed its £20m acquisition of St Ives Web, making it the largest web offset printer in the UK… Character DPM was rebranded Character Media after it was acquired out of administration by Magnadata Group, saving 11 jobs… Inc Direct renewed its £3m contract with Talk Talk for the production of customer communications across the full span of media, including print, email, SMS and digital asset management… staff at Polestar Chromoworks rejected a 4% pay cut… Polestar was taken over by the European wing of US private equity business Sun Capital Partners, and the new owners jettisoned the company’s multimillion pound pensions liability as part of the deal… The business and assets of AlitoColor Group were sold out of administration to ex-director David Collins… Bezier acquired design studio Hicksville to form a new entertainments division… The National Association of Paper Merchants revealed that UK merchants suffered £14.6m in bad debt during 2010…

May 2011

Publisher Cre8 went into liquidation owing printers around £320,000… NGS Print Finishers went into administration owing £1.5m, with almost £700,000 owed to other finishing companies… Two directors of Pinpoint Press were sentenced for their part in the supply and distribution of counterfeit DVDs and printed inlays, with a value of £2.5m… a legal claim against Technoprint from Unite over its purchase of Sessions of York was dropped… Documents came to light suggesting Polestar was near to collapse in the days running up to its takeover by Sun European Partners… employees at Wyndeham Impact held a walkout over changes to terms and conditions… Harlequin Display Group’s large-format print division, Graf, called in liquidators… Ethedo Press went into administration, but "certain company assets were sold to Ethedo Digital" according to the administrator’s statement… AB Co, Wellan Studios and RW Reprographics formed a single print business under the holding company AB Print Group and merged all operations into a single site in Batley… BGP walked away from its contract with Future Publishing on the grounds of price, with the contract being moved to William Gibbons… GW Chapman & Sons Print ceased trading… 145 jobs were put at risk at Wyndeham Plymouth as new owner Walstead looked to consolidate its web offset capacity by closing the site… X1 bought KK Print Solutions after Denise Goodacre, owner of the latter, decided to retire from the industry… Buxton Press extended its contract with Excel Publishing in a three-year, £3m deal…

June 2011

The status of Lick Group, formed to buy the assets of Lick UK just a year earlier, was shrouded in mystery after staff were sent home and managing director Linden Kitson resigned his directorship – the business was eventually liquidated… Polestar began a strategic review of its operations to trim around a quarter of its web offset capacity and 150 office staff, while changes to shift patterns at a number of plants resulted in additional jobs lost… Aldridge Print Group went into administration, with parts of it taken on by Blue Printing Group. Aldridge was subsequently found to have failed owing £2m to creditors… Wyndeham announced it was to shut its Apple web offset business after contract losses… Communisis bought the Bristol site of Orchestra, which produced the BBC TV licence, after the company fell to the administrators… Slough-based Andrews Finishing went into administration at a cost of 60 jobs as a result of the declining web offset sector… Maurice Payne Colourprint reportedly closed its doors with 60 staff sent home with no pay… Nuffield Press, rumoured to be considering a merger with Maurice Payne Colourprint (MPC), went into administration… Kall Kwik and Prontaprint franchisees settled potential legal action over ‘lack of support’ against franchise owner ODC… First UK HP Print Station revealed… Xerox Global Document Outsourcing wins major contract with supermarket chain Morrisons…

July 2011

Pindar chairman Andrew Pindar instructed KPMG to find a buyer for the £55.3m turnover business citing unsustainable margins in the web offset sector and a £19.5m hole in its pension scheme… Wyndeham entered consultation with 58 staff at Roche site… Paragon consults with 35-staff at its Sessions of York after struggling to find a suitable site locally to move the business to… Cross-media specialist Whittle Holdings bought Loewy Group to form 16-subsiduary, £100m turnover group… Personalised greetings card firm Moonpig bought by PhotoBox for £120m… York Mailing bought Pindar’s web offset division in Scarborough in a pre-pack deal after the group failed to find a buyer and was placed in administration… Williams Lea bought design and production agency Tag Worldwide and separately won a £250m central government print contract… In the mainstream media the headlines were centred on the phone hacking scandal which resulted in News International closing News of the World. The print run for the final issue was extended to 5m… Wyndeham Heron was hit by a fire which damaged a press, thought to be caused by a roller bearing seizing… Polestar published its results with the details of its acquisition by Sun European Capital Partners, revealing that the vast majority of the £20m funding directly into the print company was in the form of inter-company loans carrying eye-watering interest rates at up to 20% above LIBOR…

August 2011

Halstan Holdings bought Pindar’s map division from administrator… Unite called Thomson Litho’s plans to shift production away from East Kilbride "devastating" for its members and the area… US-based MIS/ERP giant EFI bought Prism Group Holdings, owner of the Prism WIN MIS and Prism QTMS… Administrator closed the Pindar Preston site after failing to find buyer… Heidelberg acquired German digital press manufacturer CSAT as part of plans to expand its offering in the packaging sector… It was revealed that failed printer Aldridge Print Group owed more than £2m when it went into administration in June… The BBC sold its magazine division to private equity house Exponent in £121m deal… IOS acquired the entire share capital of Lateral Group, buying out co-founders Nick Dixon, Mike Hunter and Rick Taylor… Bezier amalgamated its legacy customer IT platforms into a single, cloud-based offering called Bezier Connect… Sappi announced the successful completion of a three-year €360m (£319m) securitisation of its trade receivables for its non-South African businesses… Norwich Colour Print and F Crowe & Sons announced plans to merge to form a new £7m-plus turnover company… Tangent merged its digital agency Tangent One with customer insight firm Snowball, which it acquired for £3.2m in 2009… Webtech, the Irish company that owns packaging printer James Townsend & Sons, was to close the Exeter-based business, according to Unite… HP announced that it has shelved any further development of its Print Station programme despite only launching the service into the UK earlier in the year…

September 2011

Bezier was sold in a management buyout backed by HIG Europe, the European arm of private equity firm HIG Capital… Pindar’s Agility software business was sold out of administration to an MBO team and renamed Agility Multichannel… AGI World and Shorewood Packaging announced plans to merge to create AGI-Shorewood… Reflex Labels acquired the assets of Rivers (Midlands) which traded as The Plain Label Company (PLC Labels)… Wyndeham Group entered into consultation with 58 employees ahead of the proposed closure of its Impact plant, which had been subject to prolonged strike action… Clays announced a £5m spend on new digital book printing kit… Inc Direct secured a multimillion-pound contract with The Rank Group… Reports revealed that collapsed printers FS Moore and MPC owed creditors £3.3m between them… Reflex Labels invested £2.5m in a shrink sleeve and primary packaging division… Ratcliffe and Roper were awarded a £25,000-a-year contract by Doncaster & Bassetlaw Hospitals NHS Trust… St Ives acquired data marketing business Response One Holdings and retail and consumer insight agency Pragmar Holdings… Pensord secured £150,000 of funding from the Welsh Assembly government to train over 50 staff… F1 Colour merged with St8us Group to create a cross-media marketing services business… J&G Environmental opened a new 372m² facility in Stirling… Reflections Print offered to pay creditors just over £1m over five years under a company voluntary arrangement… Staff at Richard Edwards were placed in consultation following the company’s acquisition of Cartamundi… Meg Whitman was appointed president and chief executive officer of HP… Schawk acquired branding and design network Brandimage… Duco were ordered to pay almost £250,000 after a worker was killed at the Berkshire facility in 2008… Pindar’s Confidential Print business was sold to Secure & Confidential Documents… Paramount Printers won a six-year £500,000 contract with the Scottish Parliament… Polestar’s Barry Hibbert slammed Andrew Pindar’s comments that trading practices at his company were partly to blame for the company’s demise…

October 2011

St Ives shares outperformed the market and jumped by nearly 9% at the start of the month after the group revealed improved year-end results… IOS and Lateral Group began a strategic review of their operations following IOS’s acquisition of Lateral in the summer… Unite announced that Wyndeham would be taken to an industrial tribunal over payments to staff at Wyndeham Impact… Wallace Print Group acquired the POS business of GWD… Complete Product Company won an online, printing and fulfilment solution contract with UK Athletics… Plastic Card Services won a contract with Holland & Barrett… DS Smith completed the sale of Higher Kings Mill to Asia File Corporation… Wyndeham entered into a 90-day consultation with 280 staff at its Roche facility… Pindar’s Preston plant secured more than £2m through a private auction and online sale of equipment… 40 jobs were lost at John McCormick & Co when the company went into receivership… Anton Group placed an order for a Kodak Prosper S5 Imprinting System and two NexPress SX3900s as a part of a plan to migrate a larger percentage of its production from litho… Creditors of Reflections Print Lamination voted in favour of accepting a creditor voluntary arrangement… Communisis entered into consultation with around 90 staff at Orchestra Bristol amid plans to transfer its BBC TV contract to its Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds sites… CFH Total Document Management acquired the business and assets of FST Technologies out of administration… The Office of Fair Trading stalled Kent Messenger Group’s plan to buy seven Kent titles from Northcliffe Media Group… GED Capital purchased Polestar’s former Hungarian print subsidiary Revai Printing House… Shawbrook Bank was launched pledging to loan £250m to SMEs… The Midas Press falls into administration with 72 staff made redundant… Polestar’s hived-off pension fund enters the Pension Protection Fund… Buxton Press is crowned Company of the Year at PrintWeek Awards…

November 2011

Tangent relaunched Digital Print Partnership as Printed.com… Arrow Flexible Packaging was fined £4,500 over an incident where a worker lost two fingers… Former group operations director of Polestar Peter Andreou rejoined the group in the same role… Trinity Mirror entered into consultation with 54 of its bindery staff at its Oldham plant over a restructure of the site… Northampton-based Print 2 Hand Services launched sister company P2H Direct Mail… 4DM Group launched a new web-print service Smart Hub… Cambridge University Press contracted out its storage and fulfilment in a five-year contract with DHL… Manroland board member for sheetfed printing Markus Rall announced that he would be leaving at the end of the month… Vistaprint acquired lucrative Dutch business Albumprinter… Royal Mail closed its iRed document management subsidiary… Alderson Print Group (APG) began the restructuring of its business following the departure of several key employees… IOS’s strategic review of its operations following its acquisition of Lateral Group began with the relocation of sheet-fed manufacturing to Howitt…

December 2011

UPM general manager Will Oldham announced his intention to step down at the end of the year… Arjowiggins completed a deinking trial with HP…. Intermarketing Group was acquired in a management buyout… Benson Group was bought in a management buyout… Pagination of the Guardian was dropped… Envelope Printing Company went into administration… BT&D announced plans to shed staff… On Demand Communications falls into administration, with the Kall Kwik license acquired by former managing director Nigel Toplis… Stewarts of Edinburgh closed after 130 years… Manroland AG went into insolvency proceedings, followed by its UK counterpart… API Foils appointed former UPM man Will Oldham as managing director