Branson, Sir Richard

▪ British entrepreneur

born July 18, 1950, Shamley Green, Surrey, England

      British entrepreneur, head of Virgin Group Ltd., known for his publicity stunts and also for setting records in powerboat racing and hot-air ballooning.

      Branson, who was a school dropout, entered into his first successful business venture as a teenager with the magazine Student. When the magazine began losing money in the late 1960s, he formed Virgin Mail Order Records (so named because Branson considered himself inexperienced in business) to raise funds, and in 1971 he opened the first British discount record store. In 1973 he helped form Virgin Records, which quickly became the principal label worldwide for punk and new wave. In 1984 he became the majority backer of the airline that he renamed Virgin Atlantic Airways. Beginning with a single aircraft, the carrier succeeded despite fierce opposition from established airlines, and in 1992 Branson sold Virgin Records to raise additional money for Virgin Atlantic. By the 1990s the Virgin conglomerate, which was among the largest privately held companies in the United Kingdom, was made up of some 100 businesses, including Virgin Megastores.

      In 1986 Branson was part of a two-man team that set a record for a powerboat crossing of the Atlantic Ocean. In 1987, he and Swedish aeronaut Per Lindstrand became the first team to cross the Atlantic in a hot-air balloon, and in 1991 the pair became the first to cross the Pacific. Branson was also a member of teams that made three failed attempts in the late 1990s at round-the-world balloon flights. On the third attempt, made in December 1998, the pair were joined by Steve Fossett of the United States, and they traveled 8,200 miles (13,200 km), becoming the first to fly across the whole of Asia in a hot-air balloon, before being forced down off Hawaii. Branson later helped fund Fossett's record-setting flight in 2005, in which he completed the first solo, nonstop circumnavigation of the world in an airplane. Branson's autobiography, Losing My Virginity: How I've Survived, Had Fun, and Made a Fortune Doing Business My Way, was published in 1998. He was knighted in 1999.

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