Newsfax presses put up for sale

A raft of kit from the defunct Newsfax International business is set to go under the hammer next week, with its high-value presses being sold separately by private treaty.

The presses up for sale with Jones Lang LaSalle include a four-year-old triple-width Manroland Colorman XXL, a Manroland Cromoman single-width press with 12 towers and a Manroland Uniset, also with 12 towers. Both are five years old.

Associated mailroom kit includes an Idab Wamac and Schneider system for the Colorman, and Ferag lines for the Cromoman and Uniset.

Essex-based contract newspaper printer Newsfax International went into administration in September 2012. The firm's equipment is being sold on behalf of administrators at KPMG.

The separate Newsfax site at Bow was subsequently acquired by the FT.

The presses from the Rainham plant are expected to fetch millions of pounds. The Colorman and Uniset lines were financed by Lloyds and had a book value of £16.3m.

Jones Lang LaSalle director Spencer Chapman said the presses were "most likely" to go to overseas buyers. "It's a global market for these machines, they are late-manufactured presses and we're sure they will find a new home," Chapman said.

"There has already been a lot of interest from North and South America, and also from the Middle East, and it's still only early days," he added.

Separately, the other ancillary items from Newsfax being sold by auction next week include three Krause LS-Jet computer-to-plate systems, HP DesignJet 1050 wide-format printers, two offline inserting systems from Thorsted Schur and assorted pieces of office and factory equipment.

Details about the various lots are on the Jones Lang LaSalle website.

The online auction runs from 25-27 February, with the private treaty timeframe running to a separate deadline commensurate with the specialist nature of the equipment and the likely spend involved.