NTL has expanded rapidly since its 1996 arrival in NorthernIreland. Francess McDonnell reports on what's next for the group

When Ian Jeffers joined NTL in 1996, its Northern Ireland operation had just 20 people; today it employs close to 300 and has more than 80,000 customers on its books. By most industry standards these are pretty impressive growth rates but, to get there, NTL has had to invest more than £300 million sterling (€492 million) in the North to develop its market and build a completely new network.

The high investment level represents just a small slice of NTL's global spending spree over the past 10 years. In the United Kingdom alone, the group acquired 17 companies in less than six years. Critics of the fast-talking, high-rolling communications group warned that it would end in tears and it almost has. Today NTL owes its creditors £12 billion sterling and the group has now appointed three advisers - Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse First Boston and JP Morgan Chase - to help it find a way of reducing this debt mountain.

Last week, NTL changed direction and sold its Australian broadcast business for more than £300 million sterling, signaling a sea change for the group in the future.

But NTL is not ready to be written off just yet according to Mr Jeffers. "The group has grown from a very small regional television business to effectively become a major organisation. NTL is a leading provider of internet to broadband to digital television and telephone services.

"In the UK alone, we have three million customers. NTL has gone through a massive growth phase and the challenges we face as a business today are very different from the challenges we faced six years ago. Our key focus today is to make sure our business is strong for the future," Mr Jeffers said.

He joined NTL as head of marketing in Northern Ireland at the age of 30 and has seen at first hand how the group has evolved to a large service provider and the subsequent problems this entails.

In 1997, he left the post of deputy managing director of NTL in the North to become managing director of NTL Ireland before taking charge of co-ordinating the roll-out of NTL's broadband telecommunication services in the UK. Mr Jeffers is currently managing director of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.

"Large organisations can sometimes lose focus on what is important and I believe that, at this stage, NTL has to be very committed to its overall vision. Our vision is to provide the best possible customer service whether it is in broadband provision, telephony, digital television or as an internet provider," he said.

"Our business has been split both on a geographical basis, which allows us to get closer to our customers, and on a sectoral basis into home, business and broadcast. This restructuring process has refocused our attention on our business. Each of our regions are run as a separate entity, each has its own strengths, its own challenges. But we are able to learn from the experiences of the overall group and that is one of NTL's greatest strengths," Mr Jeffers said.

He says Northern Ireland produces "good monthly returns" for NTL and is convinced that the region will continue to be a core component of its UK portfolio.

"We have built an entirely new network across Northern Ireland with the best possible technology and we are now in a position to offer our customers much, much more," Mr Jeffers said.

He added: "Six years ago our product was totally different from what it is today, then we were in the business of analogue television and telephone lines. We are still expanding but we are expanding in a different way by rolling out broadband technology in Northern Ireland.

"We are playing an important role in the overall development of a new broadband infrastructure in Northern Ireland and it is one of the fundamental objectives of the Northern Ireland Assembly to encourage broadband investment in Northern Ireland."

He does not envisage further investment by NTL in the North in the short term. "We are not going to do huge amounts of new construction in the immediate future. But we have passed 160,000 homes in Northern Ireland. Half of those are currently connected to the network, 10 per cent of those homes have signed up to broadband and 50 per cent of those homes regularly use the internet.

"What that tells me is that NTL still has a huge potential for development in Northern Ireland," Mr Jeffers said.