This is in line with the headline rate of inflation but almost double the 1.6 per cent consumer prices index used by the Bank of England to set interest rates. But it has not been able to make the transfer as quickly as the decline in its photographic business."Mr Byers said that a sale of the UK business or restructure would help to maintain some of the group's workers, but he said it was too early to say just how many people were likely to lose their jobs.. The level of annual pay awards has hit 3 per cent over the summer, according to figures that show wage bargainers are ignoring the Government's new inflation measure. IRS revised up its estimates for the previous three months from 2.9 to 3.0 per cent.

Ilford is owned by Doughty Hanson, a private equity group, which bought the company from International Paper five years ago for £85m. Since then, the group has increased overall turnover by just 28 per cent to £128m, and Doughty Hanson's plans to float the company were put on hold.Grant Thornton said after carrying out an initial review, it had been able to reassure Ilford's 740 UK staff that their pensions were safe. However, it said that there may be some pension issues for staff based outside of the UK.Mike Byers, the head of recovery and reorganisation services at Grant Thornton, who is heading up the Ilford review, said: "The company recognised that its core market was declining and that it needed to transfer into new digital business And it's doing that quite well. Based in Mobberley in Cheshire, Ilford employs some 740 people in the UK, and has one of the oldest and most established brands in the UK photographic market, founded back in 1879.Demand for black-and-white photographic materials, which accounts for the majority of its business, has slumped, forcing the company to attempt to shift the focus of its production.

Ilford Imaging, the world's largest producer of black-and-white photographic materials, has been placed into administration, after a sharper-than-expected decline in its core business over the past seven months threw the company into crisis. The accountancy giant Grant Thornton has been appointed to assess the company's options, which include selling its traditional photographic business as a going concern. The £35.7m price reflected the improvements in sales and profits achieved by the division's management team, Laird said yesterday."The disposal is in line with our strategy of repositioning the group to higher growth markets," Mr Hill said.. "By combining Centurion into Laird Technologies the enlarged business is expected to benefit from its broader product market offering and enhanced technical capabilities, as well as its ability to exploit the convergence of EMI shielding, thermal management and antennae technologies in the growing wireless markets," the company said.Centurion, a US company, had sales of $139.7m (£85.2m) in 2003 with operating profits of $10.5m. The deal involves Laird paying Centurion shareholders £63.2m in cash together with the issue of 14.3m new ordinary shares which brought the total value of the transaction to £106.8m.The other Laird deal yesterday saw the company sell its plastics distribution business, which has annual sales of £127.7m and operating profits of £4m. For the six months ended June 30, 2004 the company had $80.7m of sales and operating profits of $5.5m. The Centurion deal will give Laird a leading position in wireless handset antennae for mobile phones and PCs, a growth area because of the spread of wireless internet connections, known as Wi-Fi, which require computers to pick up broadcast signals.Peter Hill, Laird's chief executive, said antennae technology was complementary to its existing business that specialises in electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding.

The group will focus on two divisions - Laird Technologies, which paid £106.8m for Centurion Wireless Technologies yesterday, and Laird Security Systems, which makes electronic locks.Laird's shares jumped 4.5 per cent to 319p on news of the transactions. It was out with the old economy and in with the new yesterday when Laird Group sold its plastics distribution business and bought a technology firm that makes mobile phone antennae. Laird Plastics was sold to Blackfriars, a private US company, for £35.7m. It would also provide a reasonable return for the Phoenix Consortium, which bought MG Rover from BMW for a nominal £10 in May 2000.. Last month it announced that it had bought the South Korean concern Ssangyong Motors.A takeover by Shanghai would spell the end for MG Rover's budding relationships with Proton of Malaysia and Tata of India.