Children’s healthy eating scheme Food Dudes has gone into liquidation with debts of £1.2 million.
Creditors include public health bodies, councils and Bangor University.
Founded by Bangor University professor Fergus Lowe, who passed away in 2015, Food Dudes used superhero characters who gained powers by eating fruit and veg.
It has been credited with helping more than 700,000 schoolchildren across the UK, Europe and the United States increase their intake of fruit and veg, the BBC reported.
In 2014, it won a national contract with the School Food Plan which was expected to boost its profile across the country.
The company’s name was changed to Grub Men Ltd in 2016 after it went into voluntary liquidation, and was sold to Bangor University.
Liquidator Ian Brown, of Parkin S Booth & Co, told the BBC: 'On 17 March 2016, the company's intellectual property rights were sold to Bangor University for the sum of £20,000.
'Part of the sale included the rights to the name Food Dudes Health and hence a change of name to Grub Men Ltd was registered on 3 May 2016.'
A statement from Bangor University said: “Due to public sector funding cuts, co-incident with the re-organisation of local authority and NHS service structures, the order book failed to be realised as planned in 2014-15, with income then drying up but costs steady or increasing.
'During this period the chairman and founder also unexpectedly passed away.'
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