Soft drinks group Britvic could be floated on the Stock Market early next year.
Majority owner InterContintental Hotels believes the time is right, heartened by the recent success of public offerings for Premier Foods and Irish drinks business C&C.
Its current agreement with PepsCo allows for a float after January 2005, a timetable likely to be followed despite reports that InterContinental hoped to move as early as this autumn.
The long uncertainty over the future of the business would finally be resolved by the floatation, which would see Britvic reinvented as an independent business. The City has estimated Britvic would be valued at between £600m and £700m.
InterContinental's 47.5 per cent stake was inherited from Bass, one of the pub operators which set up Britvic as a trade supplier. Allied Domecq and Whitbread each own 23.75 per cent, while US soft drinks giant PepsiCo owns five per cent.
PepsiCo had previously blocked plans for the sale of Britvic, but a 15-year bottling contract agreed earlier this year has helped to ensure the stability of Pepsi supplies into the UK on- and off-trade.
Along with Pepsi, Britvic supplies mixers and fruit juice, and brands including J20, Robinsons and Abbey Well.