MiniScribe Hires Firm for Advice on Restructuring

MiniScribe, a troubled Longmont, Colo., maker of data storage devices that was formerly headed by Quentin T. Wiles of Sherman Oaks, said it hired Merrill Lynch Capital Markets to advise it in its restructuring and to help the company raise capital should it decide to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The company said earlier this month that its debts exceeded its assets by $128 million as of July 2.

MiniScribe appeared to be a fast-growing, successful company after Wiles, a former turnaround specialist for the San Francisco investment firm Hambrecht & Quist, became chairman in 1985. But Wiles resigned last February after the company reported its first quarterly loss in more than three years, and a report prepared by MiniScribe’s new management found that massive accounting fraud had occurred during Wiles’ tenure.