Quick Facts
Biography
Will Whitehorn (born 1960) was the President of Virgin Galactic until December 2010, a company which plans to offer space tourism flights to the paying public.
Biography
Whitehorn was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom, Europe. He attended Edinburgh Academy and Aberdeen University.
Whitehorn's early career was as a crewman on North Sea helicopters and also with the Thomas Cook travel agency. In 1987, Whitehorn joined the Virgin Group after being talent spotted by Sir Richard Branson. He had suggested a number of ideas to Virgin the previous year, in 1986, whereupon the company recruited him formally. He rose to become the head of Virgin's public affairs department. In that role, where he was effectively the official spokesperson for the company, he was sometimes characterized as Richard Branson's "right-hand man".
He was, until recently, president of Virgin's space program Virgin Galactic but had to leave due to the relocation of the testing area.
Whitehorn became Chairman of the Transport Systems Catapult project in March 2013.