Opus Trust acquires UK Royal Mail's share in Optecon UK
Opus Trust Marketing has bought out the Royal Mail’s share in their joint venture transactional print company Optecon.
The 130-staff company was formed in the early 1990s as a transactional mailing division within Royal Mail, but became a separate firm in November 2001 in a joint venture.
Optecon operations director Jon Pollett said: ‘We now have a more commercial market edge and we’re no longer focused on selling off the back of Royal Mail.’
The Leicester firm produces 200m transactional mailings a year for companies such as Npower and Royal Mail using its IBM 4000 continuous laser printers and cut-sheet printers.
In February 2002 the company, which had been based within Royal Mail plants in Leicester and Chesterfield, consolidated all operations at a new 8,500 sq m Leicester site.
Copyright 2003 Haymarket Business Publications Ltd
PRINTING WORLD 21st April 2003
ROYAL MAIL BACK OUT OF PRINT
The Royal Mail has sold its stake in digital printing and mailing house Optecon, just 18 months after it was set up as a joint venture with Opus Trust.
The loss making Royal Mail has decided to focus on “core activities” and sold its 42% stake in Optecon to Opus for an unspecified amount last month, although Optecon will remain a “valuable supplier” to the Royal Mail.
The Royal Mail also owns a share in Mail Marketing in Bristol, whose finance director Neil Hopkinson says “they haven’t mentioned anything to us about selling up” but didn’t rule out a disposal.
In November 2001 the Royal Mail or Consignia as it was then called, merged its Electronic Services division in Leicester with an existing Opus-owned mailing operation in the town, called ADM, to form Optecon.
A new building opened in February 2003, which has grown from 120 staff to 200 across both Optecon and ADM.
Equipped with over 20 IBM and Xerox presses and Bell & Howell and Kern inserting lines, it sees its closest competitors as the likes of Bemrose Booth and Vertis.
A new offering is a software tool called O42 (named after 42, the “answer to the ultimate question” in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), which seeks out white space on bills and statements into which colour advertisements can be inserted to offer clients a new revenue stream.
Founded by Peter De Haan in 1999, Opus Trust owns IT company TIA and wine merchants H&H Bancroft as well as Optecon and ADM, which also has a fulfilment house in Swindon with 65 staff.
Copyright: CMP Information Ltd.
