Erinaceous is suing the previous owners of a group of companies it bought two years ago as it believes it was overcharged by more than £20m. Financial Times

A claim has been issued in the High Court by Erinaceous against Regis, a private property company, from which it bought Mount Street Holdings in November 2005. This was just one of a multitude of acquisitions – 18 in total – which allowed Erinaceous to grow rapidly after floating on Aim in 2003.

The High Court claim, revealed by Property Week, is against Peter and Nicholas Gould, Regis directors, and former Mount Street chief executive Andrew Zahn. The Gould brothers were in the public eye earlier this year when they were linked to an attempted bid for listed residential group Grainger Trust.

The claim says financial statements submitted before the deal misrepresented the value of the companies being bought.