19 Facts About Stelios Haji-Ioannou

Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou is a Greek Cypriot entrepreneur.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou was born in Athens on 14 February 1967, the second of three children of Nedi and Loucas Haji-Ioannou.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou has an elder brother, Polys, and a younger sister, Clelia.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou was later awarded four honorary doctorates from Bayes Business School, Liverpool John Moores University, Newcastle Business School, and Cranfield University.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou floated the company on the New York Stock Exchange in 2001.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou was accused of poor maintenance and charged in Italy with manslaughter, in addition to intimidating and attempting to bribe witnesses.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou blamed the accident on an error by one of the surviving crew members.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou started easyJet in 1995 when he was 28 years old, running a service between Luton and Scotland.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou conducts business via his private investment vehicle, the easyGroup, which owns the 'easy' brand and licenses it to the various 'easy'-branded ventures, including the airline.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou continues to extend his business interests, mainly in the field of travel and leisure by encouraging entrepreneurs to adopt the "easy" brand for their companies.

In September 2011 it was reported that Stelios Haji-Ioannou was working on Fastjet, a new low-cost airline serving routes within Africa, as part of a joint venture with Lonrho plc.

In 2009, Stelios Haji-Ioannou brought proceedings in London's High Court over Ryanair adverts which appeared in The Guardian, the Daily Telegraph and on Ryanair's website in January and February.

In 2010, Stelios Haji-Ioannou quit the board of EasyJet, in order to attempt to force the management of the company to abort their expansion plans.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou then went on to say: 'Basically, it's created no shareholder value for 10 years.

In 2013, Stelios Haji-Ioannou said he had become "increasingly concerned" at easyJet's expansion plans.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou announced that he sold 200,000 easyJet shares in protest against plans to buy more planes, while his siblings have done the same with their shares.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou has lived in Monaco since his family moved there when he was a teenager.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou was a member of the New Enterprise Council, a group set up to advise the Conservative Party on business policy.

Stelios Haji-Ioannou was among the benefactors of the "Make a WISH" charity event held in Monaco in June 2015, organized by the Embassy of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta to Serbia.