X-RAY tool specialist Bede is looking to raise £9.3m as it guns for a bigger slice of the global market.

The Durham-based company yesterday announced it was placing 25,641,026 new shares at 39p each.

Finance director David Hall said: "The share placings last year were about working capital, but this is very much about strategic investment."

Bede supplies X-ray metrology equipment to the semiconductor industry. Its tools can pinpoint problems during the manufacturing process, making quality control more efficient.

It has eight patent-protected products and applications to patent a further 23.

Around £3m of the cash will go on research and development - more than double last year's budget - to bring new products to market quicker.

Another £3.7m will help Bede to form partnerships with the world's leading 20 manufacturers, who represent about 80 per cent of the global market.

Chief executive Neil Loxley said: "The group has historically been limited in its ability to form collaborations with the top 20 global semiconductor industry leaders due to its limited financial resources."

The company is in talks with five manufacturers.

Dr Loxley said the cash would also provide extra working capital and strengthen the balance sheet.

The company, based on the Belmont Industrial Estate, made a loss of £2m last year, despite sales soaring by 80 per cent, to £7.3m.

About 90 per cent of Bede's products are exported, with most going to Europe and the US. First-quarter sales and orders reached £5.7m and it expects to make a profit of about £500,000 this year.

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

Mr Hall said: "Bede's technology was ahead of its time.

"There is a growing recognition from industry that, as they develop next generation products, their existing measurement technologies are no longer appropriate."

The share placing, fully underwritten by Evolution Securities, will have to be ratified at an extraordinary meeting on May 20.