Leinster Leader looks to buy Aluset

The Leinster Leader Group is understood to be at an advanced stage of negotiations to purchase Aluset, one of the Republic's leading security printers based in Glasnevin in Dublin.

The agreement is expected to leave the newspaper group, which is based in Naas, Co. Kildare, owning around 60 per cent of Aluset, with Legal & General Ventures, the British venture capital group, remaining as the other major shareholder.

Legal & General Ventures backed a management buy-out of Aluset in September 1995, buying out ICC in the process.

Aluset is one of the leading security printing companies with a blue-chip client list and a turnover thought to be in the region of £10 million a year.

It uses advanced technology to print products for the financial sector and for a range of other sectors requiring specialist products that are not easily copied. It has around 90 employees. The move represents a significant diversification for the Leinster Leader, although it does already have a small printing division. It is a successful group which had annual profits of £250,000 in 1996 and is now thought to be recording substantially higher profit levels. Aluset is believed to be trading profitably with turnover in the region of £10 million (€12.7 million). The terms of the deal under discussion between the newspaper group and the company are believed to value Aluset at between £5 million and £6 million.