I moved into a nice houseboat in Little Venice when I was 15 years old. I found a girlfriend called Monday and a houseboat called Friday, so I had the week sewn up.

...making profits is important because it keeps all our people in jobs and, you know, it keeps what we - what we've created going, but, you know, what we're - what I get my - what I'm proud about doing is creating companies which we're really proud of, you know, which we can really be proud of and a byproduct of that hopefully will be that they'll be profitable and be able to pay the bills.

What we are trying to do at Virgin is not to have one enormous company in one sector under one banner, but to have two hundred or even three hundred separate companies. Each company can stand on its own feet and, in that way, although we've got a brand that links them, if we were to have another tragedy such as that of 11 September - which hurt the airline industry - it would not bring the whole group crashing down.

Don't think about making money, think about making a difference, spot where others are doing it badly and do it better

A good idea for a new business tends not to occur in isolation, and often the window of opportunity is very small. So speed is of the essence.

I just love every minute of my life. I love the variety. Every minute of every day I'm meeting fascinating new people, learning and working with wonderful teams of people creating wonderful things.

Don't think what's the cheapest way to do it or what's the fastest way to do it. Think what's the most amazing way to do it.