De La Rue on March 2005 Sequoia was sold to Smartmatic, a multi-national technology company which had developed advanced election systems, voting machines included. In 2003, the company acquired the Debden-based banknote printing operations of the Bank of England. In 2003 and 2004 the company supplied banknotes to Iraq. The company was recognised by Hermann Simon as a role model for other small- to medium-sized businesses in his book "Hidden Champions". The Highest Perfection, a history of De La Rue was published in 2011. Written by Peter Pugh for De La Rue, it covered the years 1712–2003. In August 2014, the company announced
Thomas de la Rue Thomas de la Rue Thomas de la Rue (24 March 1793 – 7 June 1866) was a printer from Guernsey who founded De La Rue plc, a printing company which is now the world's largest commercial security printer and papermaker. Born in Le Bourge, Forest in Guernsey to Eleazar de la Rue and Rachael de la Rue, maiden name Rachael Allez. Thomas was the seventh of their nine children. Thomas de la Rue was apprenticed to a master-printer, Joseph Antoine Chevalier in St Peter Port in 1803. He went into business with Tom Greenslade and together they launched the newspaper