Delta, a UK-based engineering group, is examining a potential buyout of its £660m (€970m) pension plan, in the latest sign that new low-cost arrangements for hiving off companies' schemes to third parties may be about to take off.

Delta has a mature pension scheme with a deficit of £5.4m, and only 78 remaining active members out of a total 18,000. The company considers the longevity risk, the chance that its retirees might live longer, to be disproportionate to the scale of the company.