X-RAY tool specialist Bede yesterday unveiled plans to double turnover this year as it moves towards its first annual profits.

The company, which employs about 100 people in Durham and another 50 worldwide, reported losses of £2m last year, despite sales rising by 80 per cent to £7.3m.

However, first quarter orders this year reached £5.7m and it expects to finish the year about £500,000 in the black.

Neil Loxley, chief executive, said: "We roughly doubled revenues last year and the market expects us to do the same this year."

Bede uses x-rays to test valuable semi-conductor wafers.

It has a market share of about 14 per cent, but the potential market is expected to quadruple in the next three years.

This is because manufacturers are increasingly using nano-technology processes to augment semi-conducting wafers, with components sometimes measuring no more than 200 atoms.

Each stage of the process has to be accurately measured, or a manufacturer can spend tens of thousands of pounds on a wafer, only to find it does not work.

Traditionally, optical equipment has been used for testing. But the reduction in size of the components means that is no longer effective.

Dr Loxley said: "Two or three years ago, there were niche markets where we would be preferred, but existing technology could also do the job.

"Increasingly, x-ray is being preferred and there will be some applications for which it will be essential."

Shareholders yesterday agreed to the placing of 25,641,026 new shares at 39p each, raising £9.3m.

About 90 per cent of Bede's products are exported, with most going to Europe and the US.

The extra money will enable Bede to form partnerships with the biggest companies in the sector.

"We have already signed up some of the industry leaders as customers," said Dr Loxley.