Richard Branson is well-known for stunts in the aid of publicity for himself and his Virgin group -- dressing up as a can of Virgin Cola and sliding down a giant vending machine springs to mind, as does, regrettably, his dressing up in a wedding dress to promote Virgin Brides.

A recent photo opportunity was with Bill Clinton at the Clinton Global Initiative where he promised to use all of the profits from Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Trains to invest in renewable, sustainable energy sources. Of course, this means that Virgin will pay no tax and gets a huge amount of publicity for doing research and development. Still, this has to be a good thing and one has to congratulate Branson for mixing good business with good environmental sense.

Branson's been a hero of mine for a long time ( I have a signed copy of his autobiography) and I've been lucky enough to meet him twice: once at a book signing and once at a bar in Narita. I was introduced by then head of Virgin Entertainment Japan, Mike Inman. Virgin had sponsored the music issue of Gateway UK, the magazine that we created for the British Embassy's UK98 festival. I was very pleased with myself for getting this shot of Branson holding up a copy of the magazine.

Branson was most recently in the news unveiling the spaceship design for Virgin Galactic. Strangely, it seems that Branson isn't that well known in Japan as you might have thought. We have a questionairre at eigoTown for potential new recruits which lists famous business people such as Bill Gates, Masoyshi Son, Steve Jobs and Richard Branson. Hardly anyone ticks the box saying that they've heard of Branson.