The High Court has made orders winding up a packaging company which employed 170 people in Limerick, Kildare and Meath.

Mr Justice Peter Kelly also appointed a liquidator to the three companies which make up Ire-Tex Ltd, which has liabilities of some €7 million, with the Revenue being the largest creditor.

The winding up came when Ire-Tex Ltd, with headquarters in Leixlip, Co Kildare, was unable to find a new investor after its main customer, Dell, terminated a long-running contract. After Dell withdrew its business, Ire-Tex, had hoped that an investor could be found during an interim examinership which would preserve the remaining 170 jobs, Mr Justice Kelly said.

However, it became clear on Monday last that the investor was no longer prepared to put funds into the company and was not willing to provide support during the examinership period. The company had been in Kildare and Limerick for the last 30 years.

In the circumstances, the judge said he had no option but to order the liquidation of the companies involved. He appointed Pearse Farrell, of Farrell Grant Sparks, as liquidator to the three companies: Ire-Tex Group Ltd, Leixlip, Co Kildare; Ire-Tex Packaging Ltd, Limerick and ILP Distribution Ltd, Dunboyne, Co Meath. Ire-Tex also has operations in Northern Ireland, the Czech Republic, Malaysia, China and the US.

Dell had provided 70 per cent of Ire-Tex's business. It had been hoped that a multimillion euro rescue package could have been put in place. Ire-Tex last month began laying off 80 of its 250 member workforce but hoped to save the remaining 170 jobs.

Mr Farrell was appointed examiner and talks with a potential investor took place. The company had protection from its creditors for 70 days as Mr Farrell attempted to put a rescue package together. Moving the winding-up application, Cian Ferriter BL, for the examiner, said there were significant job losses involved. Counsel for Ire-Tex indicated that the companies were not opposing the winding up application. Ire-Tex, then called ILP, floated on the London market in 1996 at 75 pence per share in an exercise that was five times oversubscribed. It later took an Irish Stock Exchange listing.

The company, which specialised in computer packaging, numbered Dell, Intel and Gateway among its core customers and, in 2001, was reported to employ 420 people. That year, it accepted a 35 pence per share offer from a group controlled by former Ire-Tex chairman Paul Burke - a price that was 48 per cent ahead of the level at which the shares had traded.