YRM has revealed it is seeking a buyer following a difficult financial year. BD understands the 67-year-old practice is in talks with an unnamed firm, and expects a deal to be concluded next week.

YRM’s chief executive John Clemow said the firm would be moving from its current King’s Cross offices, but that he expected the YRM brand to survive.

He said: “The costs of closing our offices in Vienna and Bucharest [last year] were putting pressure on our profitability so we weren’t able to generate enough profit to maintain a balance sheet.

“In mid-2011 we were starting to turn things around, but then it became clear there was a big dip in our workload at the end of 2011 and we have been trying to backfill that gap with new work in a very difficult market.”

Clemow said it became clear that YRM “needed to join with a larger, stronger firm”, adding: “We are in the middle of that process.”

Last month YRM submitted plans to the Infrastructure Planning Commission for a 1,630MW-capacity nuclear power station at Hinkley Point in Somerset known as Hinkley Point C.

The practice is also working with client EDF Energy on plans for a new-generation nuclear station at Sizewell in Suffolk.

In its last filed accounts for the year ended 30 June 2010, YRM UK reported a pretax loss of £395,038 from a turnover of £4.3 million. This compared to a pretax profit of £680,524 in the previous year from a turnover of £5.9 million.

Last month finance director Nick Sheeran resigned and fellow director Iain Macdonald stepped down from the UK board. Since 2007 staff numbers at the firm have fallen by more than 50%, to just 25.