Nightclub firm Luminar in administration

Lava Ignite in Northampton has been closed since Nabila Nanfuka's death

A nightclub company which owns 75 venues, including one where a student died in a crush, has gone into administration.

Luminar Group Holdings PLC, which claims to be the UK's largest club owner, said it was unable to meet some of its bank repayment obligations.

Shares in the group, which employs 3,000 staff, have been suspended.

Nabila Nanfuka, 22, from London, died in hospital after the crush at Lava Ignite in Northampton on 19 October.

Luminar's payments to Lloyds, Barclays and Royal Bank of Scotland are due on 27 October.

The company recorded losses of £198m in the year to the end of February as sales dropped by 19% to £137m.

Licence suspended

Earlier this year its lenders agreed to waive banking covenants on a temporary basis.

But the business has been unable to turn itself around as the economic slump hits the spending power of its predominantly young customer base.

Luminar states on its website that it has the largest square footage of nightclub capacity in the country.

As well as the Lava Ignite brand, it owns Liquid, Oceana, Project, Fuzzy Logic, Love Social and Vibe.

The Milton Keynes-based group recently put itself up for sale but only received offers for part of the business and said these were not sufficient to generate returns for shareholders.

Lava Ignite in Northampton had its licence suspended by Northampton Borough Council on 20 October, pending a police investigation into the crush which killed Ms Nanfuka.

A 19-year-old woman, also from London, remains in a critical condition following the incident.