Whitbread, the Costa Coffee owner, is moving ahead with its plans to expand its coffee business by buying central European bar chain Coffeeheaven.

Whitbread and Coffeeheaven said that they were discussing the 24p-a-share offer that values the bar chain at 32 million pounds.

The announcement pushed shares in Whitbread up by 40p to 13.30 pounds, while shares in Coffeeheaven gained 2¾p to 22½p.

Whitbread owns around 14,000 Costa Coffee shops, with 1,000 in the UK alone, while Coffeeheaven operates nearly 90 bars in Poland, Latvia, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Hungary.

Earlier in June, Coffeeheaven said that it had started a strategic review of its business to take advantage of takeover opportunities

In September, Coffeeheaven reported a full-year loss of 185,000 pounds as recent recession hit its business hard.

AIM-listed Coffeeheaven also lifted 2.2 million pounds in a bond issue to strengthen its balance sheet.