Concerns mount over the health of the company as reports have its South Strathfield factory closed. Employees will be told if they are required to report for work on Monday.
Reports have an, as yet unidentified, administrator appointed to the company today, who is putting the business up for sale.
Telephone calls to the company’s HQ went unanswered this morning although the Hume plant at Canberra and the Matraville site were both working. There was no response from the Illawarra plant.
Focus is one of the fastest growing companies in the industry, building on the takeover of Tom Szabo’s Greenloch Print at Matraville in 2009, as well as a $6.2 million government-funded, greenfield development site in Illawarra that opened last year. Production problems have bedevilled the KBA press in the latter with reports of a serious breakdown proving tough to repair.
Under the charismatic leadership of David Fuller, Focus has pioneered ‘green’ printing as well as logistics and security printing. In recent time it has expanded rapidly the latest being the opening of the ACT factory in December last year.
Speculations that all is not well increased as a number of suppliers have asked for tight credit terms. A number have confirmed they are only dealing with the company on a COD basis. One supplier was supposedly contacted by an administrator asking for an urgent job to be released. Management supposedly denies an administrator has been appointed.
Any failure of such an iconic printer as Focus Press will have widespread repercussions especially among paper merchants as well as equipment suppliers. Unconfirmed reports have a second KBA press on the water to take up the slack at the Illawarra plant.
David Fuller declined to comment on the situation, other than to SMS cryptically… 'Not dead yet!'