Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson is an English business magnate. In the 1970s, he co-founded the Virgin Group, which today controls more than 400 companies in various fields.
Virgin Atlantic, a trading name of Virgin Atlantic Airways Limited and Virgin Atlantic International Limited, is a British airline with its head office in Crawley, West Sussex, England. The airline was established in 1984 as British Atlantic Airways, and was originally planned by its co-founders Randolph Fields and Alan Hellary to fly between London and the Falkland Islands. Soon after changing the name to Virgin Atlantic Airways, Fields sold his shares in the company to Richard Branson in return for unlimited free travel. The maiden flight from London–Gatwick to Newark took place on 22 June 1984.
David Mirkin is an American feature film and television director, writer and producer. Mirkin grew up in Philadelphia and intended to become an electrical engineer, but abandoned this career path in favor of studying film at Loyola Marymount University. After graduating, he became a stand-up comedian, and then moved into television writing. He wrote for the sitcoms Three's Company, It's Garry Shandling's Show and The Larry Sanders Show and served as showrunner on the series Newhart. After an unsuccessful attempt to remake the British series The Young Ones, Mirkin created Get a Life in 1990. The series starred comedian Chris Elliott and ran for two seasons, despite a lack of support from many Fox network executives, who disliked the show's dark and surreal humor. He moved on to create the sketch show The Edge starring his then-partner, actress Julie Brown.
Modesty Blaise is a British comic strip featuring a fictional character of the same name, created by author Peter O'Donnell and illustrator Jim Holdaway in 1963. The strip follows Modesty Blaise, an exceptional young woman with many talents and a criminal past, and her trusty sidekick Willie Garvin. It was adapted into films in 1966, 1982, and 2003, and from 1965 onwards, 11 novels and two short-story collections were written.
Virgin Group is a British multinational venture capital conglomerate founded by Richard Branson and Nik Powell in February 1970.
A paperback book is one with a thick paper or paperboard cover, and often held together with glue rather than stitches or staples. In contrast, hardback (hardcover) books are bound with cardboard covered with cloth, leather, paper, or plastic.
Virgin Books is a British book publisher 90% owned by the publishing group Random House, and 10% owned by Virgin Group, the company originally set up by Richard Branson as a record company.
Virgin Cola was a carbonated cola soft drink, launched in 1994. In 2009, it was discontinued in the United Kingdom, and in 2014 it was stopped being made by its final licensee, in Bangladesh.
John Leonard King, Baron King of Wartnaby was a British businessman, who was noted for leading British Airways. He was also directly involved with the "dirty tricks" campaign waged by British Airways against Virgin Atlantic.
Junior Boy's Own is an English record label specialising in electronic dance music. Underworld, The Chemical Brothers and X-Press 2 are its most successful artists.
Fawcett Publications was an American publishing company founded in 1919 in Robbinsdale, Minnesota by Wilford Hamilton "Captain Billy" Fawcett (1885–1940).
Necker Island is a 30-hectare (74-acre) island in the British Virgin Islands just north of Virgin Gorda. The island is entirely owned by Sir Richard Branson, chairman of the Virgin Group, and is part of the Virgin Limited Edition portfolio of luxury properties. The whole island operates as a resort and can accommodate up to 40 guests, with additional room for six children.
Keith Andrew Topping is an author, journalist and broadcaster. He is most well known for his work relating to the BBC Television series Doctor Who and for writing numerous official and unofficial guide books to a wide variety of television and film series, particularly Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
This is a list of Richard Branson's business ventures from the 1960s to today.
Save Me from Myself: How I Found God, Quit Korn, Kicked Drugs, and Lived to Tell My Story is the autobiography of Korn guitarist Brian "Head" Welch. It chronicles his life from childhood, to his days with Korn, his addiction to drugs, his embrace of a life of living for God, and the beginning of his solo career.
David Martin Tait OBE is a Scottish-born commercial airline executive, brand/marketing consultant, Washington Post best-selling author and syndicated travel columnist. Best known for his work as one of the architects of the Virgin Atlantic Airways business plan, he was one of the nascent company's first employees. During his career, Tait has served in senior executive and advisory positions for a number of airlines and travel-related companies. He is co-founder of online training company Autism Double-Checked.
Evette Huntley Branson was a British philanthropist, child welfare advocate, and the mother of Richard Branson.
The "Dirty Tricks" scandal was a series of concerted campaigns by British Airways (BA) in the 1990s seeking to undermine their rival, Virgin Atlantic. Concerned by the prospect of an upcoming challenger, Lord King, Chairman of British Airways, told his chief executive "do something about Branson". The ensuing campaign involved BA representatives impersonating Virgin employees and calling up Virgin customers to try to get them to switch their flights to BA as well as hacking computers to gain access to insider information on Virgin's flights.
How to Make a Spaceship: A Band of Renegades, an Epic Race, and the Birth of Private Spaceflight is a 2016 non-fiction book by journalist Julian Guthrie about the origins of the X Prize Foundation and Peter Diamandis, the first X Prize, the Ansari X Prize and Anousheh Ansari, the entrants into that suborbital spaceflight competition, and the winning team, Mojave Aerospace Ventures of Vulcan Inc., Paul G. Allen, Scaled Composites, Burt Rutan, and their platform of Tier One of SpaceShipOne and WhiteKnightOne.
Twisting My Melon: The Autobiography is a 2011 autobiography by the English singer, songwriter and poet Shaun Ryder, about his time fronting rock bands Happy Mondays and Black Grape. The book received mainly positive reviews from music publications, several of which considered it an entertaining read.
