Global Crossing

Assets: $22.4bn Liabilities: $12.4bn Share price: down 96% in past year

Under the so-called Chapter 11 procedure, Global Crossing will be granted protection from its creditors while it uses new funds to restructure.

The company said it would receive a $750m (�532m) cash injection from Hong Kong-based conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa and Singapore Technologies Telemedia.

"We have a new business plan which begins to address many of the concerns that we have had with our cost structures," Dan Wagner, president of Global Crossing Europe, told the BBC's World Business Report, adding that this will enable them "to eventually become a profitable business".

Even as Global Crossing tries to portray the filing as a reprieve or a new start for the company, it is hard to escape the fact that "billions of dollars of investors' funds have disappeared down an electronic plughole," the BBC's Mark Gregory said.

Debts

Part of Global Crossing's troubles came from debts built up developing its global network of fibre optic cables, which links more than 200 cities in 27 countries.

Telecom failures

Global Crossing: $25.5bn 360 Networks: $5.6bn Winstar Communications: $5bn PSINet: $4.5bn Exodus Communications: $3.9bn Figures cited are pre-bankruptcy assets Source: Bankruptcydata.com

The company had been attempting to renegotiate the debts.

On Monday, Global Crossing said it had $22.4bn in assets and $12.4bn in liabilities.

Formed in 1999 from a merger between a Bermuda-based fibre-optic cable specialist and a local US telecoms operator, Global Crossing was regarded as one of the most promising of the new generation of telecoms companies that sprang up in the late 1990s. The combined company had secured a stock market value of $75bn.

But the economic slowdown - which hit global telecoms spending - and an increase in competition, together with heavy debts, hit the company hard.

In December, amid much speculation about a bankruptcy filing, it was reported that Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing might invest as much as $1bn in the company.

Deutsche Telekom was also reported to be among parties considering providing funding.

Down 96%

Global Crossing reported losses of $3.4bn for the three months to September, and announced plans to axe a total of 3,200 jobs.

Its next quarterly results statement is due on 26 February.

Trading in the company's shares was halted for the bankruptcy announcement.

The shares have fallen about 96% over the past year, finishing last week at 51 cents.