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Number 15: Sir Michael Bishop
15. Sir Michael Bishop: £185m (£185m)
30/ 5/2005
LAST year marked a return to profitability for Sir Michael Bishop's airline, BMI British Midland.
At a press conference in London, the company chairman was happy to reveal how the low-cost carrier had transformed a 2003 loss of '8.9m into a modest 2004 profit of '2.1m.
At the same time, the number of passengers flew through the 10.5m mark. Sir Michael's interest in aviation can be traced back to Manchester.
The son of an Australian businessman who ran a Manchester factory, Sir Michael first took to the air at the age of six or seven on a pleasure flight which circled around Manchester airport, where BMI now has a presence as a major carrier and is the largest operator of transatlantic flights.
Sir Michael is the chairman and majority shareholder of BMI, an airline he has built over the last 35 years.
A bachelor with no immediate family, the 63-year-old multi- millionaire, who was raised in Bowdon and Hale, has said that he plans to leave his fortune to a charitable trust after his death.
His estimated wealth remains unchanged at '185m.
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