Exertis administrators expect unsecured creditor payout as £41.5m Aurelius claim faces review

The administrators of Exertis (UK) Limited expect unsecured creditors to receive a distribution despite the technology distributor’s collapse with an asserted £41.5 million secured debt to Aurelius Finance Company Limited, according to proposals that reveal the scale of the losses and creditor issues preceding its May administration.

Martin Armstrong and Andrew Bailey of Turpin Barker Armstrong and James Hopkirk of Kreston Reeves, who were appointed joint administrators on 29 May 2026, are pursuing a controlled wind-down after the company’s core trading operations had substantially ceased. The administrators said preferential creditors are currently expected to be paid in full and, subject to the outcome of a review of Aurelius Finance Company’s security, they expect funds to be available for unsecured creditors above the statutory prescribed part.

The proposals provide substantially more detail on the deterioration that followed Aurelius’s acquisition of the UK and Ireland Info Tech business from DCC plc. Management accounts for the five months from November 2025 through March 2026 show turnover of approximately £180.6 million but a net loss after tax of approximately £166.2 million, compared with a £47.9 million loss for the year ended March 2025. The administrators attributed the collapse to declining revenues, low margins, difficult technology distribution markets, liquidity pressure, disruption to supplier and credit support following the ownership change, and the costs of implementing a major turnaround programme.

The company was both balance-sheet and cash-flow insolvent by the time the board considered its options in April. Gross trade receivables had been estimated at about £28 million, while trade creditor balances initially totalled approximately £69 million before management adjustments and reconciliations reduced that figure to about £19 million. The company had also entered settlement arrangements with roughly 40 creditors requiring aggregate monthly payments of around £1 million, with the second scheduled payment expected to be unaffordable.

A central issue in the administration is Aurelius’s asserted £41.5 million secured claim under a fixed and floating charge granted in October 2025. The administrators are reviewing the validity, enforceability, amount and priority of that claim, as well as approximately £27.5 million held in accounts potentially subject to trust arrangements. Hopkirk is leading that review, with Kingsley Napley advising on the security and trust issues. Its outcome could materially affect how recoveries are divided between Aurelius and the wider creditor body.

The administrators have meanwhile secured approximately £13.16 million of cash held in Exertis bank accounts and recovered about £3.84 million from trade debtors. A further potentially significant recovery relates to approximately £16.1 million of intercompany receivables, including about £15.9 million recorded as due from former owner DCC, although no value has yet been attributed to those balances because recoverability remains under investigation.

The administration is also overseeing the disposal of residual stock and equipment and the wind-down of remaining third-party logistics contracts. Independent valuations put Exertis’s tangible assets at approximately £1.64 million on an in-situ basis but only about £461,000 on an ex-situ basis. At the date of administration, all but 19 employees had already agreed voluntary redundancy arrangements or settlement agreements, with a limited number retained to assist with debtor recoveries, stock ownership disputes and the wind-down.

The administrators said the controlled trading period has generated a deficit to date, but argue that keeping parts of the operation running has supported debtor collections, supplier settlements and other recoveries that would have been lost in an immediate liquidation. They intend to continue pursuing receivables, resolving retention-of-title and consignment stock claims, reviewing Aurelius’s security and investigating Exertis’s affairs before ultimately considering a creditors’ voluntary liquidation to distribute funds.

Read the administrators’ proposals here.