Britvic first-half profit tops forecast

LONDON (Reuters) - Britvic (BVIC.L), Britain's second biggest soft drinks group behind Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE.N), beat forecasts with a 13 percent increase in first-half profit as its still drinks outperformed the overall market.

The firm, which makes Robinsons squash, Britvic juice, J2O, and R Whites lemonade, and has the rights to sell Pepsi in the UK, made a pretax profit of 17.2 million pounds ($33.6 million) in the 28 weeks to April 13.

The result was ahead of analysts' forecasts which ranged between 13.9 million and 15.9 million pounds.

At 0705 GMT (8:05 a.m. British time), Britvic shares were up 3.5 percent at 337 pence, valuing the business at about 728 million pounds.

The group increased total revenues by 29 percent to 454.7 million pounds boosted by a first full 28-week contribution from Britvic Ireland, the business it bought from C&C Group (GCC.I) for 170 million pounds last year.

Britvic said it was on track to deliver its targeted annual synergies of 14 million euros (11.15 million pounds), following the acquisition, by the end of 2009.

It added that it was confident of meeting its expectations for the full year.

Britvic is paying an interim dividend of 3.8 pence, up 15.2 percent on the previous year.

(Reporting by Matthew Scuffham; Editing by Louise Ireland/Mark Potter)