Scunthorpe supplier to data centre industry collapses with jobs lost

A Scunthorpe-based provider of equipment to the data centre market has collapsed leading to the loss of 17 jobs.

Joint administrators for Cross-Guard Limited, which has a head office on Queensway Industrial Estate, have retained 22 staff to help complete orders and for installations on contracts. Gareth Rusling of insolvency specialist Begbies Traynor and Charles Ranby-Gorwood of CRG Insolvency & Financial are now looking for potential buyers for the goodwill and assets of the business.

They were called in by a director of the business after it was said to have become unviable. Cross-Guard had supplied specialist kit such as cold and hot aisle containment, modular caging and ventilated server safes, among other security-based items for the domestic and commercial markets.

The business - established in 2016 - had sold to a range of major brand names such as IBM, HP, Amazon and Google and its expertise and products had been used for projects across Europe and the US. Last month the firm had exhibited at the Data Centre World conference at London's Excel Centre.

A spokesperson for Begbies Traynor Group said: “It is very early days, and the joint administrators are actively working through all the financial information in detail to establish and contact all of the creditors and debtors, and to understand the cause of the failure of the business, but it is already clear that the business was unviable.

“Sadly, redundancies have already been forced, and more are expected once the current work in progress is completed and the contracted projects are fulfilled. More information will become available in coming days and weeks, but our responsibilities are to protect the interests of the creditors, and to manage the process of redundancy that is affecting the employees.”