On Tuesday, a judge ruled that HP was owed almost £740m from Lynch and his business partner Sushovan Hussain over the fraudulent sale of their software giant Autonomy 14 years ago. With Mr Hussain having settled privately, Lynch’s estate is on the hook for the majority of the damages.

Hewlett-Packard (HP) lost hundreds of millions of pounds through its acquisition of British software company Autonomy, which was founded by Mike Lynch, a High Court judge has ruled.