Sale of company

Hi all,

After discussing this issue with a number of colleagues and failing to come up with a good solution, I am hoping someone out there may be able to help me.

A client of mine is selling his limited company but wishes to remove all properties, cash and assets from it before doing so.

As the company has long standing contracts with it's main customers, setting up a new limited company for the trade is not an option as this would constitue a breach of contract and mean that the customers could be lost.

A lot of people are saying the answer is to set up a holding company, transfer all of the assets out, and then sell the original company on to the buyers.  However, I think that this would trigger a capital gains charge due to a change of ownership within 6 years.

Therefore, my question is is there a way of doing this without triggering an immediate tax charge?

Thank you in advance to all who can assist.