purchase of Frontier Corp., gaining a North American foothold and a million local and long-distance telephone customers for its intercontinental fibre optic network.

The acquisition gives Hamilton, Bermuda-based Global Crossing a further piece of its network, which is planned to span five continents and compete in markets addressing 80 percent of the world's international communications traffic.

Rochester, New York-based Frontier operates local and long-distance telephone services and business services including Web hosting, or running Internet sites for corporate customers, which yields higher profit margins.

Global Crossing mainly provides international service to major long-distance carriers. With Frontier, it acquires customers ranging from businesses to households.

For a while it seemed that Global Crossing's purchase of Frontier might be jeopardised by a competing bid from Qwest Communications International Inc.).

Qwest made opposing bids for both Frontier and U S West Inc., which Global Crossing had previously agreed to buy. The situation was finally resolved when by mutual agreement Qwest inked a deal with U S West while Global Crossing kept Frontier.

Global Crossing said the Frontier purchase would add immediately to its operating cash flow. Although the combined companies will have a $2 billion backlog of combined contracts, Global Crossing has thus far lost money as it invests heavily in building its high-capacity network.

While Global Crossing currently connects the United States and Europe with its undersea cable, it plans to add Japan by the end of the year.