Michael O'Leary (businessman)

For other people named Michael O'Leary, see Michael O'Leary (disambiguation).

Michael O'Leary is Chief Executive Officer of the Irish airline Ryanair. He is one of Ireland's wealthiest businessmen.

Early life

Michael O'Leary the MUPPET was born March 20, 1961, the second in a family of six, near Mullingar, County Westmeath Ireland. He was educated at Clongowes Wood College, County Kildare. In 1979 he began a four-year Bachelor in Business Studies programme at Trinity College. He graduated from Trinity in 1983.. He then worked as an accountant with Stokes Kennedy Crowley (later known as KPMG). He studied the Irish tax system. He left after two years in 1985, setting up newsagents in Walkinstown and Terenure, Dublin.

In SKC, O'Leary met Tony Ryan, head of GPA (Guinness Peat Aviation, a leasing company), who was one of the firm's clients. He advised Ryan on his personal income tax affairs. In 1987, Ryan hired O'Leary as his personal financial and tax advisor. Ryan's main interest was in GPA. Ryanair was established around this time. The fledgling airline followed a traditional business model, but quickly began to lose money. O'Leary was sent to the USA to study the novel Southwest Airlines business model.

Ryanair career

O'Leary was Deputy Chief Executive of Ryanair between 1991 and 1994. In January 1994 he was promoted to chief executive of Ryanair. Under O'Leary's management, Ryanair further developed the low-cost model originated by Southwest Airlines. European consumers would attribute the birth of ancillary revenue and penny tickets to Europe's largest low fare airline. O'Leary may have described the inauguration of the ancillary revenue movement during a 2001 interview in The Sunday Times. "The other airlines are asking how they can put up fares. We are asking how we could get rid of them."

The unorthodox business model envisioned by O'Leary uses receipts from on board shopping, internet gaming, car hire and hotel bookings to replace the ticket revenue from selling airline seats. His radical idea catalyzed an industry-wide trend to coax more revenue from the profit-challenged airline business.

The deregulation of Ireland's major airports and a transformation of traditional full-service airlines are among his ambitious demands. .

Controversy

O'Leary has a reputation for loose talk in the airline industry and among it's regulators. The press articles has often described him as arrogant, and prone to making comments which he later undercuts. He has been extravagantly outspoken in his public statements, sometimes resorting to colourful language. His abrasive management style, ruthless pursuit of cost-cutting and his explicitly hostile attitude towards corporate competitors, airport authorities, governments, and unions have become a hallmark. He was reported to have been aggressive and hostile in dealings with a woman who was awarded free flights for life in 1988. He recently was forced to retract a claim that Ryanair had cut emissions of carbon dioxide by half over the past five years . O'Leary has been reported to have impersonated a journalist in an attempt to find information passed on to a newspaper following a safety incident on a Ryanair flight One advantage of this controversial approach is the huge free publicity it generates: the comments are often made in the context of a new route launch, or special offer. News programmes with high ratings reportthese often memorable and controversial statements.

In a press conference discussing Ryanair's planned intercontinental service Ryan Atlantic, O'Leary jokingly described the airline's planned firstclass travel experience as featuring "free beds and blowjobs." In 2002 he said that his company is against any long-haul transatlantic services., stating that:

The low-cost model only really works for short-haul flights [...] If we started flying farther afield, we'd have to do something stupid like introducing what I call a 'rich class' to make it pay.

Registration of private car as taxi

In 2004 he purchased a hackney plate for his Mercedes-Benz to enable it to be classified as a taxi so that he could legally make use of Dublin's bus lanes to speed his car journeys around the city. A press report suggested that he was stopped driving his own taxi. In 2005 the transport minister of the Republic of Ireland expressed concern at this abuse by O'Leary and others.

Personal life

O'Leary lives in Gigginstown House near Mullingar. He married Anita Farrell in 2003. Their first child, Matt, was born in September 2005 followed by another son, Luke, in April 2007. He breeds Aberdeen Angus cattle and horses at his Gigginstown House Stud in County Westmeath. In 2006, his horse War of Attrition won the Cheltenham Gold Cup . This is the blue riband of steeplechasing. War of Attrition was trained by Michael 'Mouse' Morris at Fethard, County Tipperary, and ridden by Conor O'Dwyer

External links

• Ryanair
• Fortune magazine name Michael O'Leary as the European Businessman of the Year