The Cambridge Crown Court has sentenced former Izodia director Gerald Smith to eight years in jail for false accounting and misappropriating £34m of the IT company's funds.

Smith, who was also suspended from acting as company director for 15 years, pleaded guilty in April this year.

Izodia traded as a software company during the dot-com boom, the SFO said today, but become a cash shell when the dot-com bubble burst. In 2002 Smith, 51, used his Jersey-based property business to buy a substantial stake in Izodia and exert control over the business.

He proceeded to use his influence to transfer Izodia's main cash asset from a Royal Bank of Scotland account in reading to Jersey, where he proceeded to steal it.

The Thames Valley Police and The SFO began an investigation of the case in 2002 and charged Smith in February 2005.

Proceedings were also commenced against two other defendants, Jarlath Vahey and Peter Catto, ex-directors of Izodia.

Smith pleaded guilty to ten counts of theft and to one count of false accounting.