When Sir Richard Branson, founder and chairman of British conglomerate Virgin Group, was asked this week what advice he would give to someone working in a big company frustrated by a lack of innovation he said: “Write a letter to senior management expressing your views. Ideally get some others to sign it with you. I’ll write it for you if you want.”
Sir Richard was speaking to the 100 Innovators Club of entreprenuers at the Open Innovation Forum in Moscow on Wednesday. The Club comprises 50 young entrepreneurs from Russia and 50 from other countries, selected from 900 applicants, who spent four days in Moscow at the youth forum, getting to know each other and receiving tips and advice from experts and role models including Dan’l Lewin (Microsoft), Nick Cammarata (Thiel fellowship winner and co-founder of Tablo) and Thomas Whitfield (founder of Oxford Biolabs). The international youth programme is coordinated by Russia-based venture capital firm Synergy Innovations and is sponsored by software provider Microsoft. The forum was hosted by government organisations RVC, Skolkovo, Rusnano, Moscow City and Vnesheconombank.
Filip Perkon, the event co-organizer, said: “The 100 Innovators Club that was created as a result of the youth forum will be a valuable network of top international entrepreneurs that will grow with every forum. The community will foster international cooperation with the Russian innovation ecosystem, and also assist with the globalisation of Russian start-ups.”
Other advice to the group from Sir Richard included “find people better than yourself to run your business” and “don’t think about making money, try to change to world and make peoples’ lives easier”.
He went on to tell a story which demonstrates his entrepreneurial flair and how his airline, Virgin Atlantic Airways, was born. At the age of 26 he was stranded in Puerto Rico when a scheduled flight was cancelled due to a shortage of staff. “I desperately wanted to get to the Virgin Islands because I had a pretty girl waiting for me,” he said. Even though he had insufficient funds, he found a spare aircraft at the airport and chartered it before returning to the terminal, writing ‘Virgin Airways, Flight to Virgin Islands, $26’ and collecting cash from similarly stranded passengers. He used the cash to pay for the aircraft; the rest is history.
Sir Richard jokingly wondered aloud why he helps young entrepreneurs, given a previous experience at a similar event years ago when he was grilled by a young man interested in how to set up a low cost airline. The man, Stelios Haji-Ionnou (now Sir Stelios), went on to launch a competitive airline, EasyJet, which beat Virgin to winning landing slots in Moscow this July.
Sir Richard used the Open Innovation Forum to announce a new $200m growth equity fund at his Virgin Green Fund to co-invest in clean-tech with state-backed investment manager Rusnano Capital. He is also planning to take tourists into space (Virgin Galactic) and is building a submarine to explore the deepest parts of the oceans.