Phones4U has attracted around 10 parties interested in acquiring the retailer, with the deadline for first round bids expiring next Wednesday.

Dixons is among those to have expressed an interest, along with Everything Everywhere, the mobile phone group formed out of the merger of Orange and T-Mobile.

As Everything Everywhere already owns 720 high street stores, any bid would likely come under scrutiny by the competition regulator.

Other interested parties include a raft of private equity firms, including Advent International, Blackstone, BC Partners and Hellman & Friedman, the Daily Telegraph reported.

Phones4U has 480 stores. Earlier this week it revealed a sales fall of 5.6% during 2009, with profits plummeting 58% to £13.7m. It blamed this on the ‘challenging’ retail environment and its failure to secure rights to sell Apple’s iPhone.

Phones4U was founded in 1987 by John Caudwell. He sold it to Providence Equity in 2006 in a deal that was worth a total of £1.5bn.