ENDICOTT, NYEndicott Interconnect Technologies’ unsecured creditors could make a bid to buy the bankrupt printed circuit board fabricator at auction, a new report says.

A group of representatives for the unsecured creditors asserts that the secured creditors, which include the company's founders, have engaged in financial maneuvers to position themselves for the best chance to take over the company while also forfeiting their debt obligations.

Founders James Matthews and two members of the Maines Family hold $16.1 million in secured debt from EI, and are likely to try to exchange that debt to purchase the company, the representatives indicated.

EI is scheduled to be auctioned by a federal bankruptcy judge on Sept. 24.

Documents filed with the court claim Matthews and the Maines used their “control and influence...to cause the debtors to make preferential transfers” to them, breaching fiduciary duties." The representatives argued that the insiders shouldn’t be allowed to use forgiveness of these claims to purchase Endicott Interconnect.

Matthews, who left EI earlier this year to launch a competitive bid for the company, owns 22% of the firm, plus secured claims worth more than $11 million. Integrian Holdings, a firm he started and that EI transferred millions in cash to earlier this year, made a stalking horse bid of $250,000 in cash and $6.1 million in debt forgiveness for the company. That bid was rejected by the court.

The Maines are owed $5 million in secured debt.

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