Thirdforce, the e-learning company, has trimmed its pre-tax loss for the half year to €572,000. In the same period of 2003, the company reported a pre-tax loss of €609,000.

However, chairman Mr Pat McDonagh pointed to the company's €623,000 operating profit recorded before goodwill, amortisation and non-recurring items were taken into account. This compared with an operating loss in the first half of 2003 of €136,000.

The company's half-year turnover was up from €2.7 million to €5.8 million. Gross profit rose from €2.1 million to €4.7 million.

The company's chief executive, Mr Brendan O'Sullivan, said the company was cutting back on its losses and extracting strong value from recent acquisitions such as Electric Paper, purchased last year for €15.5 million. He said the company was looking to make another acquisition.

Mr McDonagh, the company's largest shareholder, said the Electric Paper deal, together with the acquisition of AV Edge Ltd, had resulted in net debt rising from €1.7 million to €3.2 million over the six-month period.

"Earnings per share, adjusted for goodwill amortisation and non-recurring items, was 31 cent for the six months to June 30th, 2004, representing a significant advance on the equivalent loss per share of 38 cent in the prior year period, and a 15 per cent increase on the equivalent earnings per share for the six months ended December 2003 of 27 cent."

He said the company would continue building a global e-learning company through "acquisition and organic growth". Mr O'Sullivan expressed optimism for the second half of the year and said trading was in line with expectations.

He said 80 per cent of the company's shareholders were Irish.