Review of 2017: July

All the biggest stories from the past 12 months.

Route One Print kicked off a £5.3m summer spend with the purchase of finishing kit and completed, later that month, with a Fujifilm Jet Press and an LE-UV litho press... Bradley Group bought Northern Irish commercial printer Nicholson Bass... Apogee Corporation bought Canon equipment reseller Clarke Office Solutions... Park Communications invested in a highly specified KBA Rapida 106 with features new to the UK, its second KBA press investment in 18 months... Elle Media Group bought the goodwill of MPC Print Solutions... Grafenia acquired Image Everything for £3m... Clayton Park Print Finishing Services appeared to have ceased trading... Similarly, Key Print Finishing appeared to have closed its doors... US-based label giant Multi-Color Corporation acquired Constantia Flexibles’ Label division in a £1bn deal... Blake Envelopes purchased the plant, machinery and order book of Rapid Envelopes, which had been in administration... Former employees of Paperlinx were denied their day in court after liquidators from Deloitte made an eleventh-hour offer to settle the Protective Award claim... St Ives sold the Peterborough factory occupied by Wyndeham Peterborough as part of its ongoing strategic review... VR Print took on the assets and goodwill of NXP Europe, which went into administration the previous week... Packaging giant Essentra said it was to close its “structurally challenged” Newport IP5 site... Cimpress posted a bigger than expected loss after a year of substantial change. Later in the month the company announced the sale of its photo album business Albumprinter... Ortek closed its doors, with one source saying director Craig Morris was “sick of subsidising the business”...