From humble milkman to WorldCom chief

EVEN by the bloated standards of late-Nineties corporate America Bernie Ebbers was in a class of his own. The man from Edmonton, Canada, who started his career as a milkman, bestrode the US telecom market with a swagger that matched his wealth.

Everything about the 6ft 4ins bearded colossus - from his 164,000-acre ranch in Canada to his yacht Acquasitions - was larger than life, building up a 'cult of Bernie' - not least on Wall Street where he was revered for the profits he made for shareholders.

It was dizzy stuff for a man who only entered the telecoms-industry in 1983 when he was in his forties. Legend has it that he was trying to find a way of making more money from a motel and struck upon the idea of selling surplus long-distance phone capacity at a discount.

He turned the motel into a free-standing company, called Long Distance Discount Services (LDDS). By 1989 LDDs, now renamed WorldCom, was big enough to be floated on Nasdaq and a decade-long binge of more than 70 acquisitions followed. During that time Ebbers amassed a personal fortune estimated at more than $1bn at its peak.

However, what marked him out was the scale of the cheap loans advanced to him by the company. Last year it emerged he owed the company $366.5m (£251m), despite WorldCom's debts of more than $30bn. Ebbers ordered a huge cost-cutting drive. His credibility sank like a stone and, in April, he was forced out of the company. But even in enforced early retirement Ebbers was to receive a £1m annual pension and retain access to the company jets - perks he may now have to do without.