I had no plans to be an entrepreneur. I just wanted to be a journalist and write for a magazine. At 15, I just decided to leave school and launch a national student magazine.

We had an electrical fault about 500 miles into the trip and lost more than half our fuel. We had a fire on the roof. And missed Los Angeles by 3,500 miles at the end of the trip and ending up in the arctic in a snowstorm.

I just wanted to create things that I could be proud of. Money was just an evil byproduct to pay the bills at the end of the year.

My mother always taught me never to look back in regret but to move on to the next thing. The amount of time people waste dwelling on failures rather than putting that energy into another project, always amazes me. I have fun running all the Virgin businesses-so a setback is never a bad experience, just a learning curve.

Actually, we did a fun April Fools' thing with Google a couple of years ago, which we called Virgle. And we looked for volunteers to go on a one-way trip to Mars.

Universities are fantastic places to gain knowledge on a subject, develop a personal network, explore your character and learn new techniques to approach problems. I do however believe that there is a strong argument for students who have an idea they are passionate about to just try and turn it into a reality. I fell into this category and I don't regret not going to University.

When people warn me against doing something once my mind is made up, I grow increasingly determined to try it.