Word: branson
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Everyone calls him Stelios. It's part of a strategy inspired by Richard Branson, founder of Virgin. The idea is to become a populist icon behind a brand that is expandable to any number of consumer businesses. Populism is good for business, though a little odd for the billionaire son of a Greek Cypriot shipping magnate who spends his weekends in Monaco. Stelios started in his dad's business of oil tankers but became famous with easyJet, a no-frills airline modeled on U.S. carrier Southwest Airlines. EasyJet now flies to 18 cities in Europe; its planes are more than...
...also helped that the Blackmans worked every possible angle in pushing their investigation. A friend of Tim's who had once worked as an airport limo driver in London had given several rides to Sir Richard Branson, legendary founder of Virgin Enterprises. The driver phoned Sir Richard's office and, a few days later, Virgin offered to help the Blackmans open a Tokyo office for their investigation...
...About a year ago Branson even had to fight off bankers who wanted to close his Our Price high street shops, which are being retooled into mobile phone and CD stores. Bower's book suggests that Branson had to sell his Virgin Atlantic stake to pay his debts and save Our Price. Branson counters: "We could have kept it afloat through the general funds of Virgin...
...this makes some wonder if Branson does too much. In fact, Whitehorn told Time that Virgin is going to stop launching lines in order to expand its current businesses into new markets. But the vital point is that like any brand, the Virgin label is part illusion. (Did Coke ever really teach the world to sing? Is Virgin Cola anything but another kind of bubbly brown-sugar water packed into bright red cans?) Branson says he's the business world's equivalent of Ralph Nader. His Virgin Atlantic really did innovate business-class air travel and as Virgin Blue airline...
...Bowker reckons that if Branson's stakes in his various companies were put on the public markets, they'd be worth roughly $3 billion. That would make Virgin a medium-to-big sized company. What's remarkable is how Branson created all this value. He put up only $26 million of the more than $90 million that created Virgin trains, but he owns half of it. He also has half of Virgin Direct, for which he says the Australian firm AMP provided most of the funding. Taking Virgin Mobile phones to Asia, Branson got Singapore Telecom, like Singapore...