- Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo (Wired)
When it comes to entrepreneurial companies, one must give a nod to one of the most successful and risk-taking of them all: Virgin Group, founded by the daredevil British business magnate Richard Branson.
Branson had his first experience with entrepreneurship when he was 16 years old, selling records from the crypt of his church at considerably lower prices than competitors. It became an instant success and eventually forced the entire record industry to embrace large-scale discounting of recorded music.
- Virgin founder Richard Branson (Forbes)
Even though he was successful, Richard Branson was not done there – he then started a recording label called Virgin Records, signing once niche bands like The Sex Pistols and Faust.
Not satisfied with even two successful ventures, Branson and Virgin Group decided to get into the airline industry with Virgin Atlantic and the mobile industry with Virgin Mobile and countless other industries with: Virgin Drinks, Virgin Holidays, Virgin Radio… the list goes on.
Recently, Virgin has even started a company called Virgin Galactic, offering sub-orbital space flights to extremely wealthy passengers.
All in all, Virgin is a company that fits the definition of entrepreneur really well: it takes a lot of risk, venturing into markets that no other company has ventured into before and it gets rewarded for this risk-taking by the speed at which it generates wealth.