Recruitment company Marlborough International has confirmed it is in discussions with the Spring Group on acquiring certain parts of Spring's business.

Spring is a British-based recruitment and training company. Created in 1989, it is publicly-quoted and employs more than 2,600 people.

Last year, it reported a loss of £7.2 million sterling (€11.79 million) on turnover of £396 million sterling when exceptional costs were taken into account. It comprises three distinct divisions - IT services, education services and general services.

Spring Personnel, part of the general services branch, is regarded as the most likely fit for Marlborough. With turnover of £65 million sterling and profits of £5 million sterling, Spring Personnel would represent a major acquisition for a company of Marlborough's size.

It is likely Marlborough would have to pay a multiple of eight times profits for the business. This would value the deal at more than £40 million sterling.

With a network of 30 regional offices in Britain, the acquisition would almost double the size of Marlborough and provide it with a profitable and sizeable network in Britain. According to Spring, its personnel business fills more than 3,000 permanent positions each year and provides 3,000 temporary staff in secretarial, clerical, industrial and technical positions to blue-chip companies.

The acquisition route represents something of a departure for Marlborough, which itself was the subject of takeover talk this year.

In August, Marlborough announced it was in preliminary discussions with another party on the possible sale of the group. However, it confirmed yesterday that all discussions had now ceased.