The sites, which specialise in commercial printing, packaging, fulfilment and pre-media, were bought by the Matlet Group, which was established by Gary Stiffler, former executive vice-president of Quebecor World's commercial group.

"This acquisition represents an exciting opportunity to restore local ownership to these facilities," said Stiffler.

This latest sell-off by the Canadian printing giant comes just two weeks after the company sold six Canadian operations to another MBO team, Graficom, in a 26m deal.

With sales of over 78m, Matlet will include the Acme Printing company, Central Florida Press and Packaging Graphics.

The group, which has more than 600 staff, produces catalogues, magazines, inserts, folding carton packaging and annual reports for the travel and leisure and automotive industries.