Global Crossing

Global Crossing Limited

Type	Public
Traded as	NASDAQ: GLBC
Industry	Telecommunications
Fate	Merged into Level 3 Communications
Founded	1997
Headquarters	Hamilton, Bermuda
Key people	John Legere, CEO
Revenue	US$2.536 billion (2009)
Operating income	US$2 million (2009)
Net income	US$141 million (2009)
Number of employees	5,235 (2009)
Website	globalcrossing.com

Global Crossing (GLBC) was a telecommunications company that provided computer networking services worldwide and operated a tier 1 carrier. It maintained a large backbone network and offered transit and peering links, Virtual private network (VPN), leased lines, audio and video conferencing, long distance telephone, managed services, dialup, colocation and VoIP. Its customer base ranged from individuals to large enterprises and other carriers, with emphasis on higher-margin layered services such as managed services and VoIP with leased lines. Its core network delivered services to more than 700 cities in more than 70 countries.

Global Crossing was the first global communications provider with IPv6 natively deployed in both its private and public backbone networks. It was legally domiciled in Bermuda, although its administrative headquarters is in New Jersey. On October 3, 2011, the company was acquired by Level 3 Communications.

Global Crossing was founded by Gary Winnick, Abbott L. Brown, David L. Lee, and Barry Porter in 1997 through Pacific Capital Group, Winnick's personal venture group, which had experienced mixed results in its twelve-year history. In 1997, Global Crossing raised $35 million of capital from the CIBC Argosy Merchant Funds (later Trimaran Capital Partners), the heads of which were former associates of Winnick. Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) realized an estimated gain of $2 billion from its relatively small equity investment in Global Crossing, making it one of the most profitable investments by a financial institution in the 1990s.