Scheufelen understood to be winding up

Insolvent German paper mill Scheufelen is being wound up, according to German media reports.

The Lenningen-based company filed for insolvency in February, seven months after it was resurrected as Scheufelen GmbH after securing investment from Berlin-based Green Growth Fund 2/Wermuth Asset Management, Hamburg-based Nordia Invest and Scheufelen Equity Partners.

The company’s predecessor Papierfabrik Scheufelen had filed for insolvency at the end of January 2018.

The German press has now reported that Scheufelen GmbH is being wound up, with 75 of its remaining 95 staff let go on 1 May, the day that wages and salaries of the staff were understood to have been secured until.

Insolvency administrator Philipp Grub of Grub Brugger’s Stuttgart office reportedly told EUWID Papier und Zellstoff “that there had been interested parties in the context of the investor process, but in the end it had come to no conclusion”.

In February, Print.de had said that Scheufelen attributed its bankruptcy to “a much slower rate than expected” increase in sales of its grasspaper product, which is made from grass fibre and pulp.

Last week the same publication reported that Grub said “no investor solution could be found” for the business, whose remaining employees “are still busy with the remaining processing, in particular the sale of the products still in stock”.

The publication also stated that Grub had said that Scheufelen’s Lenningen base, machines and facilities do not belong to the company, and that it is therefore their respective owners “who decide on the further use or exploitation of these objects”.

With Scheufelen’s insolvency proceedings therefore “extremely low in mass” it added that “against this background, the insolvency creditors would have to expect no quota payment”.

PrintWeek was unable to reach Scheufelen for comment at the time of writing.