Bottler Coca-Cola HBC, which reported a first quarter pre-tax loss of #37 million (£29 million) - down from #46.8 million in the same quarter last year - hopes to be profitable by 2002.

Newly appointed managing director Mr Irial Finan, from Roscommon, said that, while the company remained a loss-maker, the key measure of its performance was earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), which was up 13 per cent on the same quarter in 2000.

"Our headline EBITDA is up 13 per cent but the underlying growth is up 37 per cent," Mr Finan said. "There were some one-off payments which were booked to revenue and when you strip those out the company achieved underlying EBITDA growth of 37 per cent."

He said sales revenue for the quarter rose 14 per cent to #732 million and volumes rose 10 per cent to 228 million unit cases, with emerging markets showing the greatest increase in take-up.

Performance in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland was satisfactory, Mr Finan said.

He said Schweppes, which Coca-Cola took over from Cantrell & Cochrane, and Sprite, which it introduced in the Irish market in January, were performing ahead of plan for the first quarter.

Coca-Cola HBC, formed after a merger of Coca-Cola Beverages and Greek Hellenic Bottling in August 2000 with a capitalisation of about #4 billion, lists on the Athens stock exchange with secondary listings in London and Sydney.

It has exclusive franchises for Coca-Cola products in most markets it operates in, including parts of western and eastern Europe and Nigeria.