Andrew Hosking and Tony Flynn of financial adviser Grant Thornton were appointed as administrators on 2 June.

"Although Excelprint has generated sales of around 6m over the past year, it has experienced cash flow problems," said Hosking.

However, he stressed the business was continuing to trade as a going concern, and was confident a sale could be achieved. "We are already talking to a number of interested parties," he said.

No redundancies have been made so far among its 70 employees.

According to its last set of accounts for the year ending 31 March 2002, the firm, which featured in PrintWeek's Top 500, and posted sales of 7.8m, pre-tax losses of 109,000. The firm was one of the first in the UK to take Heidelberg's CutStar sheeter system.

The latest records filed at Companies House name Martin Tamlyn, formerly European managing director of 58k.com, as company director. He was appointed in June 2003.

Story by Andy Scott