A two-way radio company has been given a new lease of life after it was bought out of administration by a former employee.

Atlas Personal Communications - which began life as Nortech Radio Telephones in 1973 - went into the administration last year.

However, Atlas - which had offices in Carlisle, Glasgow and Dumfries - has now been bought by Nigel Metcalfe, who began his career working at Nortech over 30 years ago.

Nigel, who also runs Nationwide Telecom, in Kendal, has set the company up in a new office at Pacific House, in Carlisle.

Atlas was involved in supplying two-way radio systems to business, as well as office refurbishment.

Nigel said he had bought the radio side of the business, retaining its three staff, and named the company Nortech Radio Communications.

He said Nationwide Telecom, which employs two employees at its office on the Shap Road Industrial Estate, would eventually come under the Nortech brand.

Nortech currently has 10,000 radios in use across Britain, servicing approximately 2000 customers from Aberdeen to Cornwall.

“We work with a lot of the quarries, schools, warehouses, security firms, taxi companies,” said Nigel.

He said hotels were also increasingly using two-way radio systems to communicate with their staff.

“We’ve got quite a lot of radios going out on short-term loans for shows. It’s quite a wide and diverse thing.”

Despite the use of mobile phones, he said radios still had distinct advantages in some situations.

“You can only make a phone call from one person to another whereas with a radio you can talk to everybody,” he said.

Nigel completed the purchase of the company after a three-month negotiation with administrators.

“I’m very grateful for the radio customers for staying loyal to us, their continued support not just to the business but also towards the key radio staff with whom they had formed trusted partnerships throughout this very difficult situation has been unbelievably unwavering. We will look to exceed their expectations and deliver excellent customer service.”