Contrary to the sweetness of his name, this British entrepreneur and businessman with an estimated fortune of £830 million and positioned 92nd on the Sunday Times Rich List 2008, is publically known more for his hard hitting cynicism and the catchphrase ‘you’re fired’ than for whispering sweet sounds of encouragement in his contestants’ ears.

While the recent success of The Apprentice helped make Sugar a TV personality and household name, his rise in the financial stakes began many years previously, in his childhood in fact.

Born into poverty in Hackney in 1947, Sugar’s entrepreneur qualities and determination to succeed financially are evidenced in his commitment to work early on, notably boiling beetroots for the local greengrocers, producing and selling ginger beer to neighbours, and buying, cutting and re-selling photographic film to school friends. By the time he saw his 13th birthday he was earning more than his Dad did in a year as a tailor. After a brief spell as a civil service statistician, Sugar ventured into sales, selling cigarette lighters, intercom and TV aerials.

Sugar founded his first business enterprise in 1968 with Amstrad, an acronym of his initials (A.M.S. Trading). It became one of the UK’s leading consumer electronics companies. In 1970 Amstrad began manufacturing hi-fi turntable covers which owed their success to the use of injection moulding plastic instead of the usual vacuum forming processes, thus significantly undercutting its competitors. Business success continued when Amstrad introduced its first computer package in 1984 as well as launching and selling 3 million 8-bit machine Amstrad CPC 464s, while the following year Amstrad launched the first mass market dedicated word processor, the Amstrad PCW 8256 WP. In 1986 Amstrad bought the rights to the Sinclair Computer product line and produced 2 more Spectrum models. At its peak, Amstrad achieved a stock market value of £1.2 billion during the 1980s. The 1990s proved to be a difficult time with customer dissatisfaction resulting from unreliable disks. Amstrad promptly sued Seagate for $100million for business losses. The release of the Pen Pad, a PDA in 1993 showed a shift in focus from computers to telecommunication. Amstrad was divided into two businesses in 1997, Betacom and Viglen Ltd respectively. In July 2007, Amstrad was bought by broadcaster BSkyB for the tune of £125 million.

Sir Alan’s purchase of and chairmanship for Tottenham Hotspur from 1991 – 2001 proved to be a less profitable and a more controversial period, especially since it was claimed that Sugar only viewed this proposition from a business instead of from a footballing perspective. His sacking of Terry Venables the night before the FA Cup Final resulted in a legal battle which Sugar won. Troubled times followed until February 2001 when Sugar sold his majority stake to leisure group ENIC for £22 million and his remaining share in June 2007, again to ENIC, for £25 million. Reflecting on his 16 year involvement with Spurs, Sir Alan has described it as being ‘a waste of my life.’ Despite his turbulent time at Spurs, commentators have noted that he behaved with dignity and honesty, and that he can be accredited for the Club’s present state of financial security.

Sugar established four other business sectors of the Amstrad empire. Firstly, Ansair, founded in 1993, it operates a Cessna fleet and one Embraer ERj-135 that offers business jet charters. It has access to over five thousand aircraft of varying shapes and sizes, which are mostly appointed in collaboration with Blue Star Jet. Next is Amsprop, Sugar’s investment firm which bought the IBM South Bank building in September 2006 and which comprises the majority of Sugar’s £800 million fortune. Then there is Viglen Ltd, owned and chaired by Sugar himself, it provides IT services to the education and public sectors. Following the sale of Amstrad plc to Rupert Murdoch of BSkyB, Viglen became Sugar’s only remaining IT business project. Finally, Amscreen, launched in 2008, it is responsible for screen manufacture and content, although it is anticipated that the majority of revenue will be sourced from selling advertising space. Amscreen holds a stake in Consteck M2M, a company that specialises in machine-to-machine communication where devices are enabled to communicate with each other without the need for human interaction. Chief clients include Camelot, newspaper chain Newsquest and Nitendo.

From humble origins to one of Britain’s richest men, Sugar received a knighthood from Queen Elizabeth II in June 2000 and was awarded a Doctor of Science degree from City University, London, in July 2005 for his role as benefactor in various projects, notably for being the driving force behind the Excalibur Scholarship Scheme in 1993. Although sweet in name, Sugar is as hard as candy rock when it comes to business and, even today, doesn’t suffer fools gladly.

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