PrintWeek revealed last week that Scanlon had reached an agreement to take control of the Vertis operations in Croydon, Leicester, London and Swindon, and that he was on the verge of buying Boxstar out of administration.

His restructuring and investment vehicle Overgoal finalised the deal to buy the loss-making Vertis DM arms on 3 October. "It's widely known that some of the businesses have been performing poorly financially," said Scanlon. "We intend to review each of the operations as a matter of urgency."

He added that he was in no doubt that the businesses, which sources said made a combined loss in excess of 600,000 in August alone, presented an opportunity but "it will be challenging".

Boxstar was acquired by TP8, a wholly owned subsidiary of TP3 (formerly Thomas Potts). It was bought from administrator Price-waterhouseCoopers on 28 September for a consideration of 7.5m.

Boxstar comprises the former packaging interests of Polestar, which were bought in an MBO last year.

The 38m-turnover business has four plants in Accrington, Leeds, Maiden-head and Leicester.

Scanlon said the Boxstar name was being dropped and it was likely that the plants would revert to their previous trading names of Broadley, Jowetts, Hannibal and Taylowe.

He added that TP3 had "been successful in establishing new trading lines" with suppliers and that that there had been no redundancies among the 310 staff. It is not yet clear whether the former MBO team will stay on.

Scanlon is also chairman of StreamGWC, which he sold to TripleArc in January.