Ward Knowles went into administration with insolvency practitioner KPMG on 28 July 2009; its main site in Accrington was sold to print giant Paragon Group on Tuesday, with about 66 jobs being saved.

The Manchester site, which employed 23 staff, 11 of which were made redundant, was not part of the Paragon deal.

Paul Flint, associate partner at KPMG, said: "We can confirm that we are close to concluding a sale of the Ward Knowles Manchester site to a separate party [to Paragon Group], and hope to make a further announcement on this over the coming days."