Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson

                                  SIR RICHARD CHARLES NICHOLAS BRANSON

The great entrepreneur, Richard Charles Nicholas Branson is a billionaire whose projects began in the music industry with a small record company known as Virgin Records but he expanded into several other sectors which made him one of the most successful men in the world.

Branson was born on the 18^th July 1950 in Surrey, England. He came from a respected family wherein his father, Edward James Branson, was a barrister and his mother, Eve Branson, was a flight attendant. As a child, Branson was known to have been struggling with dyslexia and he had a difficult time pursuing his education. He attended the Scaitcliffe School until he was 14 and was transferred to a boarding school in Stowe, Buckinghamshire, England, called Stowe School. However, since he was still struggling, he decided to drop out of school at the age of 16 and took the choice of starting a youth-culture magazine called Student. The latter was done completely by students and was sold mainly to students. In 1966, during its first edition, the magazine sold $8000 worth of advertising. The first 50 000 copies was distributed for free as Branson covered the outlay with advertising.

By 1969, Branson was staying in London, surrounded by British music and mush drug scenes. It was at this time that Branson got the idea of starting a mail-order record company which he would name Virgin in order to help support the magazine efforts. The company was quite small but was working enough so as to give Branson the opportunity to expand his business venture by adding a record shop in Oxford Street, London. The latter was a success and enabled Branson o build a recording studio in 1972 in Oxfordshire, England.

The first artist to be on the Virgin Records label was Mike Oldfield with his single “Tubular Bells” in 1973 with the help of the team that Branson had arranged. The song was an instant hit by staying on the UK charts for about 247 weeks. At the same time of Oldfield’s great success, Branson seized the moment by signing several aspiring musical groups to the label, including the Sex Pistols. Following artists like the Rolling Stones and Genesis contributed in making Virgin Records one of the top six record companies in the world.

Branson continued to expand his business by adding a travel company, the Voyager Group, in 1980, the airline Virgin Atlantic in 1984 and several Virgin Megastores. However, by 1992, Virgin Records started facing a lot of problems and struggled to stay financially afloat. During the same year, the company was bought by Thorn Emi for $1 billion. The self entrepreneur Branson was crushed by the loss but was resolute to persevere in the music business.

He founded the station Virgin Radio in the following year and in 1996 he started a second record company, V2. Branson’s Virgin Group has now more than 200 companies in over 30 countries namely the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Asia and South Africa. He added a train company, a luxury game preserve, a mobile phone company and even a space tourism company, Virgin Galactic to his business expansion.

Branson was knighted in 1999 for his exceptional contribution to entrepreneurship and in 2009 was the 261^st man in the Forbes’ World Billionaires list with $2.5 billion in self made fortune. He is well known as well for his adventurous personality and sports achievements such as being the first man who crossed the Atlantic and Pacific by hot-air balloon.