A bankruptcy court in Delaware has apparently put back a deadline for approving Fruit of the Loom's proposed bankruptcy-sale procedures, following a revision in the conditions of a takeover bid for the company by Warren Buffett's holding company, Berkshire Hathaway.

Berkshire had been given until today to change the terms, or an $835 million (€940 million) offer which could save the struggling clothing manufacturer could have fallen through.

However, a spokesman for Fruit of the Loom, which employs 830 people in the north-west, told The Irish Times yesterday that there would be no hearing today. A motion had been filed to court "and when there is a hearing we will know what the next step is", he said.

Last week, Chief Judge Joseph Walsh of the US Bankruptcy Court rejected the Berkshire Hathaway bid, on learning it would charge termination fees of $30 million if it was outbid at auction for the company's assets - or if the offer was not accepted by creditors. The level was "hard to believe" he said.

Fruit of the Loom told the court in a submission on Monday that Berkshire Hathaway was willing to reduce the termination fee in connection with the auction to $25 million and the termination fee for all other termination events to $22.5 million, increasing by $1.25 million per month starting in January 2002 to a maximum of $27.5 million.

Judge Walsh had said the original Berkshire Hathaway conditions could have a coercive effect on creditors, who would eventually vote on a reorganisation plan constructed around Berkshire's asset purchase agreement.

A lawyer for a group of Fruit of the Loom shareholders said they would oppose the request for a new hearing for the same reasons they objected to it in the first place.