Review of 2014: November

All the business news, from acquisitions to liquidations, investments to divestments, from a year in the industry.

Online trade printer Route One Print invested in a four-colour Heidelberg Speedmaster XL 75 with coater to boost its efficiency and print quality. “We looked at other suppliers but the output quality and post purchase support that Heidelberg provides with our existing equipment was the main factor in our decision,” said managing director Adam Carnell... A ruling by the Employment Appeal Tribunal on 4 November meant that some UK employers would need to factor overtime pay when calculating workers’ holiday pay. The ruling, which marks the first UK interpretation of a European Court of Justice decision, means that all employees working compulsory overtime could be able to claim for additional holiday pay. Only basic pay currently counts towards holiday pay... “Solid growth” in its printing plates and CTP business helped propel Kodak to its first profit since emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, although the results were also boosted by a one-off gain from its intellectual property... HPM & Addo has fallen into administration and is understood to have been sold to one of its directors, Keiran Bayley, in a pre-pack deal. The £3.7m-turnover firm was established in April by the merger of HPM Group and Addo Printing... Uckfield-based digital and litho printer Pureprint has ordered three HP Indigo 7800 presses, which will mark the first multiple 7800 installation in the UK. The sheetfed 7800, which has a list price from £575,000, was launched earlier in 2014... Avery UK, a subsidiary of Toronto-based specialty label and packaging giant CCL Industries, acquired self-adhesive label printer Label Connections, which trades as PCL, in a deal worth around $2.5m (£1.58m)... Heidelberg clarified its plans for post-press kit manufacturing, after having announced in August that it was exiting the saddlestitching and perfect binding market. In fact it turned out the company has some post-press launches in the pipeline. It will, however, be exiting areas of finishing where it can't make any money... The first fruits of the partnership between Bielomatik and Matti Technology, a fully integrated 300m/min high-speed book and publications production line: the duplexing Bielomatti PageMaster Press... KBA has posted significant increases in sales, operating profit and pre-tax earnings in its results for the nine months to 30 September 2014. Group sales increased 8.5% to €791.8m (£620m). However, the company's order backlog and order intake both showed a negative trend... 

241114-coverMercian Labels’ new factory in Burntwood, Staffordshire was formally opened by MP for Lichfield Michael Fabricant on 7 November. The label printer recently purchased the site on the Plant Lane Business Park to continue its demand-driven expansion... Manroland Sheetfed-owner Langley Holdings was set to acquire the German print chemicals group DruckChemie out of administration. A spokesman for Langley Holdings said: "We are delighted to have reached agreement to acquire DruckChemie, the company complements our Manroland print business and further demonstrates our commitment to the sector"... West Yorkshire-based greetings card company UK Greetings announced that it would cease manufacturing in the UK by April 2015 and outsource production to North America and East Asia...  CFH Docmail was appointed to Lot 2 of the £1.2bn General Practice Systems of Choice (GPSoC) framework agreement for its hybrid mailing services, including Docmail and the newly-developed ROVa. CFH is one of 30 suppliers appointed to Lot 2 Additional GP IT Services Framework, which is worth between £20m and £220m of the anticipated £325m to £1.2bn combined GPSoC spend... Millnet Document Solutions, the joint venture between Yolanda Noble and document management specialist Millnet, was placed into administration after a key client significantly reduced its work and various delays in new projects going live... Smith & Ouzman (S&O) has denied making corrupt payments of more than £400,000 in order to win contracts in four African countries. In January the Serious Fraud Office charged S&O, together with two of its directors, one employee and an agent of making corrupt payments totalling £433,062.98 to officials in order  to "influence the award of business contracts to the company"... There was bad news for staff at Polestar's Petty and Colchester operations. Both plants were expected to be closed down before Christmas. On 25 November, workers at Polestar Colchester were told that the plant would close on Christmas Eve. Polestar Petty had already been sceduled to cease print operations on 20 December... Shaftesbury-based printer Blackmore will install the UK’s first KBA LED UV press. The £1m-plus four-colour Rapida 105 will be the firm’s first KBA and is fitted with Air Motion Systems' LED curing technology. Installation is slated for the end of January... William Gibbons joint managing director Mark Gibbons praised the “superb” response of firefighters and the firm’s employees after a fire destroyed one of the company’s web presses. The business was back in production the following day...