In a few months' time Clifford Martin Stanford will walk across an area the size of a football pitch somewhere in the middle of what was once war-torn Bosnia.

As he negotiates what would seem to be the most mundane of feats, Stanford, the founder of Demon Internet, the internet service provider, and one of Britain's richest self-made millionaires, will be egged on by employees of Redbus, his fledgling conglomerate, which builds everything from boats to pop careers.

If Stanford completes his stroll successfully he will breathe a huge sigh of relief: the ground over which he is to walk is currently a minefield. But not for much longer if Stanford's latest company, Redbus Landmine Disposal Systems, does its job properly. The RLD system uses two devices: Bigfoot, a machine that stomps all over a minefield, detonating hidden explosives; and 'worm', a machine to chew through the soil, ploughing it up to detect booby traps.

Great in theory - but is Stanford just a wee bit nervous about how it will work in practice? Apparently not.

'I'd be very happy to walk out there. We want to send a team of footballers to play on the ground we're so confident the system works,' he says, stifling one of many yawns, the result of an early-morning commute to London from his home in Brussels.

The blueprint that led to Redbus LDS was one of 2,500 Stanford's company has received since it started life two years ago with a £15m cash pile - half of what Stanford earned from selling Demon to Scottish Telecom, now called Thus, for £66m. All of Stanford's businesses are branded around the Redbus name. 'We wanted a name that implied London and the UK but was pronounceable all over the world. And, as I said to somebody once, I needed a "vehicle" for investment.'

The Demon sell-off turned Stanford into an overnight celebrity. The walls of his office, just off Oxford Street, are plastered with news about himself, Demon and Redbus. Missing from the gallery, however, are the salacious details of Stanford's love life plastered over the News of the World last year. Predictably, the 1,200-word account of champagne-fueled romps with two table dancers in Claridges, in his Rolls-Royce and his private jet confirmed he had the 'demon touch'.

'Cliff doesn't have any inhibitions,' nude dancer Natalie said, breathlessly. 'Let me tell you - his bank balance isn't the only impressive thing about him. That man certainly has breathtaking assets.'

Larry Ellison, Oracle's flamboyant MIG-flying boss, could be in danger of losing the 'most interesting internet mogul' mantle at this rate.

Among friends and colleagues Stanford shrugs off the article: 'All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.' And if things had turned out differently, Cliff could have been a very dull boy. An accountant by training, Stanford taught himself to write computer code in his spare time.

He struck gold when he worked out that if he built an internet service provider he could charge others for providing access to the net to subsidise his own surfing. It was the first time anyone had attempted to bring internet access to Joe Public's desktop. 'I worked out that if we got 200 users we'd break even; with 400 we'd make a small profit.'

Nobody predicted that by 1998, when Stanford sold the business, Demon would have 250,000 subscribers.

Stanford, small and squat, with a smoker's voice, could have retired at 46. After the Demon sale he emigrated to Belgium, where he now lives as a tax exile - when he's not at his villa in southern Spain, that is. But he says the reason he founded Redbus was to 'put something back' by investing in innovative British businesses. 'What drives me is the fun of doing things and making people rich, helping ideas turn into businesses.'

Stanford says he wouldn't have been able to found Redbus if he hadn't left the UK to avoid capital gains tax: 'It's counter-productive. It's a bad tax. If they could stay here and keep that money, more people would do something with it back home.'

The first venture Stanford invested in was Redbus Interhouse, which specialises in building and running internet 'hotels', the datarooms that take care of firms' online activities. The company listed on the stock market last year via a reverse takeover. 'It was voted - and I have the certificate to prove it - the best-performing share of 2000 - which, considering the downturn in the tech market, is actually pretty impressive.'

The share price has subsequently taken a hammering. Shortly after it floated in March the share hit the 300p mark. Last Thursday, however, it fell 19 per cent to 84p on the back of disappointing figures. The company lost £6m last year - far greater than the £4.7m its house broker had predicted.

Nevertheless, Stanford says the company will turn a profit - excluding charges for interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation - this year. The float raised around £100m, which will be used to turn Redbus into the European market leader for web-hosting services.

But Interhouse, so far the only publicly quoted part of the Redbus empire, is one of the more prosaic members of Stanford's stable. There's Redbus Film Distribution, for example. Stanford recently sold a 51 per cent stake in the business in a deal that valued the firm at around $40m. Unfortunately the buyer, a Scandinavian company, has yet to stump up the cash. Stanford, however, believes that this will be sorted out and that the future is rosy.

Then there's Redbus WorkBoats, a company that builds platformed boats for use by divers, police and photographers. Stanford admits business has been slow: 'It's a new concept and it's taking time for people to realise that. It has yet to convince the world.'

He also has great hopes for Redbus Continuous Professional Training, currently in the business of helping dentists gen up on their knowledge, and Redbus Serraglaze, a firm that uses prisms to bounce light into rooms that don't see too much sun.

This is not to forget Girls@Play, the pop group that Redbus's investment arm is now backing. The group's first single charted at number 18 recently. Stanford had held a board meeting with the band shortly before The Observer arrived. ('It's great fun doing a board meeting with five girls, you know.') He has great hopes for the album: 'In my opinion they're the best girl band around by a long way. We had a bloody good single. They know their fans and their fans know them. If they do what the Spice Girls did we could make millions.'

Cliff Stanford, the demon king of pop. It has a certain ring about it. Perhaps Stanford will be featuring in the News of the World again before too long. And next time he'll be able to put the cutting on his office wall.

Profile

Name: Cliff Stanford

Age: 46

Job title: Founder, Demon Internet; founder, Redbus Investments

Hobbies: Flying; playing online computer game Everquest (he recently attended a convention with 100 ardent fans in Blackpool); building his villa in Spain.