The "Bird Nest" national stadium, the centrepiece of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, could end up bearing the name of a foreign company, local media has reported.

The naming rights for the iconic 91,000-seater arena will be sold after the Olympics and there will be no bar to foreign companies bidding, Zhang Hengli, deputy manager of National Stadium Company (NSC), said in an interview in the Beijing News.

Labourers operate bulldozer at night at the construction site for the National Olympic Stadium, also known as the "Bird's Nest", in Beijing after Spring Festival holiday.[photobase.cn]

"It may not be accepted by the public but we have spent over a billion yuan ($129.4 million). How can we pay out without getting a return? I have thought about the public opinion, but I don't care."

Zhang also said the stadium would not be open for free after the Olympics as was the case in 1976 host city Montreal, although 20,000 to 30,000 visitors a day were expected.

That would still go nowhere near paying for the running costs of the stadium, which Zhang put at 40 to 50 million yuan per year.

"The revenue from tickets, adverts, hotels, restaurants and other attaching commercial facilities still can't cover the cost of the stadium's maintenance ... the most profitable part is the title rights," he said.

NSC, which is owned by China's top state-owned enterprise CITIC Group, is in charge of building the stadium and running it until 2038.

The company has to pay 42 percent of the 3.13 billion yuan cost of building stadium with the government covering the remaining 58 percent.

Beijing Games organisers announced last month that the stadium would not now be completed until next March, despite officials having said it would be finished by the end of 2007.

The Beijing Olympics starts on August 8, 2008.