"Legacy financial problems" and the loss of a large customer forced the 12m-turnover corporate and commercial printer into administration with UHY Hacker Young on 18 November.

Managing director and controlling shareholder Angus Steel has left and his role will be taken over by Hughes, who, prior to joining the former Virgin print management arm in 2001, was with the Goodhead Group.

Thomas Potts chief executive Mark Scanlon and finance director Richard Fookes are also investors in the new business, which will trade as Wace in the short term.

Hughes said he and his fellow Ringdark directors had been looking for a buy-in opportunity for some time. "This presented us with an opportunity to save what is, without doubt, an excellent high-quality printer," he said.

All of Wace's 90 staff along with its presses, three Heidelberg B1 long perfectors, have been retained by the company, which will continue to trade from the existing factory.

Wace recently won PrintWeek's Report & Accounts and Brochure Printer of the Year awards, but despite the high standard of print it produced it was unable to sort out its complex financial situation, which dates back many years, prior to Steel's buyout from the old Wace.

Murray Booker, formerly a director of Close Print Finance, who had worked closely with Steel said: "I appreciate, from a Close viewpoint, the considerable effort Angus put in over this period to keep things afloat. This has clearly taken its toll on him."

The union welcomed news that no redundancies had been made. "The new owners certainly seem to be approachable and we have started up a dialogue with them," said South Wales & Shires branch officer Martin Hodges.



Wace Swindon history

1987 Chris Watson sells Thamesdown Litho to Wace group for 3m-plus

1993 Name changed to Wace Corporate Print

1995 Watson leaves Wace and sets up competing plant a year later

1997 Angus Steel, an accountant by trade, is called in to turn round the plant's fortunes and sell it "within three years"

1998 Wace accelerates sales plan and offers Steel chance to buy business

1999 Steel leads MBO in January

2004 Placed into administration and bought by Ringdark. Steel leaves

Story by Lauretta Roberts