City spin specialists go on sale

Alan Parker, the public relations guru who was consulted by Stephen Byers last week over the administration of Railtrack, is believed to have asked Goldman Sachs to find a buyer for his business, Brunswick.

The PR operation, which is the City's most successful with clients ranging from Cazenove to Marks & Spencer, British Airways and the Prudential, is estimated to be worth more than £200m.

Mr Parker, who founded the company in the mid-1980s, has constantly denied that he wants to sell the operation, in which he owns a majority of the shares. But the recent market downturn, an expensive expansion in New York and an investment in the online video-streaming business Cantos, have made him change his mind.

Marketing services groups such as WPP and Omnicom are known to be keen to buy the operation but Mr Parker is understood to prefer a deal with a management consultancy. Accenture, which recently floated in New York, is a possible favourite purchaser. Industry experts believe that Mr Parker may have mistimed the sale of Brunswick.

A number of City PR businesses – including Buchanan, Maitland and Square Mile – have sold for large amounts in the last couple of years and the market peaked with the purchase of Finsbury, which is a fraction of the size of Brunswick, by WPP for £40m.

Brunswick is believed to have made 20 people, including two partners, redundant last month as a cost- cutting measure.