The Eastern Daily Press reported that Uniglaze was 15 days away from going into administration when a refinancing deal was brokered with a local partner and existing shareholders to keep the £22.5m turnover firm in business.

Creditors agreed to take 71p per pound of debt rather than get nothing if the company had gone under.

Philip Davis took over as managing director of Uniglaze on February 1 to turn the ailing business around.

He said: “The business has had a fairly rocky few years but has now been refinanced through the voluntary arrangement. Creditors will get 71p in the pound, but they would probably have got nothing if we had been wound up.

“From the customers’ point of view, the deal means they get continuity, we are still the same business, the warranties are still maintained and for our 315 staff, they keep their jobs. If we had been wound up, they would have been out of work.”

Uniglaze entered into a voluntary arrangement, where a company makes a court-approved agreement with its creditors, of formally agreed terms for the settlement of its debts.

The arrangement arose in May after HMRC refused to enter into a repayment agreement with Uniglaze.

Uniglaze owed £4.6m to unsecured creditors but has worked out a deal to pay its creditors – mainly suppliers – 71p for each pound they are owed, so that it can stay in business. Customers, and warranties on their products, will not be affected.

Uniglaze has been losing money in recent years, posting losses of £800,000 to the year end July 2009 and losses of £1m the following year.

A key part of the new arrangement sees major investment from window frame manufacturer Swift Group Holdings from the Sweet Briar industrial estate in Norwich, along with a cash injection from existing shareholders.

Davis said: “The plans for the future are to fundamentally change the way the business operates. There will be no redundancies but there will be significant cost savings in raw material utilisation and a big change in the way we deal with waste.

“The vision is to continue with a £22.5m turnover, break even within the first year, reduce waste, expand slowly and maintain stability.

“We have been improving quality and the quality of our service and we want to get back most of the customers we lost five or six years ago and re-establish ourselves in East Anglia as the pre-eminent unit manufacturer, which we were until 2005/06.”