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Alan Michael Sugar, Baron Sugar (born 24 March 1947) is a British

business magnate A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...

, media personality, author, politician and political adviser. In 1968, he started what would later become his largest business venture, consumer electronics company

Amstrad Amstrad was a British electronics company, founded in 1968 by Alan Sugar at the age of 21. The name is a contraction of Alan Michael Sugar Trading. It was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in April 1980. During the late 1980s, Amstrad ...

. In 2007, he sold his remaining interest in the company in a deal to

BSkyB Sky UK Limited is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television and broadband Internet services, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of ...

for £125m. Sugar was the chairman and part-owner of

Tottenham Hotspur Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, commonly referred to as Tottenham () or Spurs, is a professional association football, football club based in Tottenham, London, England. It competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English footba ...

from 1991 to 2001, selling his remaining stake in the club in 2007 as well, for £25m. He is also known for being the host and "Boss" for the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

reality competition series ''

The Apprentice ''The Apprentice'' is a Reality competition, reality talent game show franchise originally aired in 2004 in the United States. Created by U.S.-based British producer Mark Burnett, the show depicts contestants from around the country with variou ...

'', which has been broadcast every year, with the exception of 2020, since 2005. He also assumed the role for ''

The Celebrity Apprentice Australia ''The Celebrity Apprentice Australia'' is an Australian reality television series which aired on the Nine Network. Based on NBC's ''The Apprentice'', it first aired on 24 October 2011 and originally featured Mark Bouris, the founder and chairm ...

'' for Australia's

Nine Network The Nine Network (stylised 9Network, commonly known as Channel Nine or simply Nine) is an Australian commercial free-to-air television network. It is owned by parent company Nine Entertainment and is one of five main free-to-air television netw ...

in 2021. According to the ''Sunday Times'' Rich List, Sugar became a billionaire in 2015. In 2021, his fortune was estimated at £1.21bn, ranking him as the 138th-richest person in the UK.

Early life

Sugar was born on 24 March 1947 in Hackney, East London, into a

Jewish family Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...

. His father, Nathan, was a tailor in the garment industry of the

East End The East End of London, often referred to within the London area simply as the East End, is the historic core of wider East London, east of the Roman and medieval walls of the City of London and north of the River Thames. It does not have uni ...

. His maternal grandparents were born in

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

, and his paternal grandfather was born in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

. Sugar's paternal grandmother, Sarah Sugar, was born in London to Polish parents. When Sugar was young, his family lived in a

council flat A council house is a form of British public housing built by local authorities. A council estate is a building complex containing a number of council houses and other amenities like schools and shops. Construction took place mainly from 1919 a ...

. Because of his profuse, curly hair, he was nicknamed "Mop head," a name that he still goes by in the present day. He attended Northwold Primary School and then

Brooke House Secondary School BSix Sixth Form College: Brooke House is a sixth form college located in Upper Clapton, London, England. It was established in 2002, giving students in Hackney the opportunity to study at a college close to where they live. Brooke House has previ ...

Upper Clapton Clapton is a district of East London, England, in the London Borough of Hackney. Clapton is divided into Upper Clapton, in the north, and Lower Clapton to the south. Clapton railway station lies north-east of Charing Cross. Geography and origi ...

, Hackney, and made extra money by working at a greengrocers. After leaving school at the age of sixteen, he worked briefly for the civil service as a statistician at the Ministry of Education.

Amstrad

In 1968, aged 21, Sugar set up

with £100 of Post Office savings. He started off selling radio aerials for cars and other electrical goods out of a van which he had bought for £50 and insured for £8. Amstrad CPC464

The name of the company was formed from his initials: Alan Michael Sugar Trading. It began as a general importer/exporter and wholesale; by 1970 the first manufacturing venture was underway. He achieved lower production prices by using injection moulding plastics for hi-fi turntable covers, severely undercutting competitors who used vacuum-forming processes. Manufacturing capacity was expanded to include the production of audio amplifiers and tuners. In 1980, Amstrad was listed on the

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...

and during the 1980s Amstrad doubled its profit and market value every year. By 1984, recognising the opportunity of the home computer era, Amstrad launched an

8-bit In computer architecture, 8-bit Integer (computer science), integers or other Data (computing), data units are those that are 8 bits wide (1 octet (computing), octet). Also, 8-bit central processing unit (CPU) and arithmetic logic unit (ALU) arc ...

machine, the Amstrad CPC 464. Although the CPC range were attractive machines, with

CP/M CP/M, originally standing for Control Program/Monitor and later Control Program for Microcomputers, is a mass-market operating system created in 1974 for Intel 8080/ 85-based microcomputers by Gary Kildall of Digital Research, Inc. Initial ...

-capability and a good

BASIC BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College ...

interpreter, it had to compete with its arch-rivals, the more graphically complex

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...

and the popular

Sinclair Sinclair may refer to: Places * Lake Sinclair, near Milledgeville, Georgia * Sinclair, Iowa * Sinclair, West Virginia * Sinclair, Wyoming * Sinclair Mills, British Columbia * Sinclair Township, Minnesota * Sinclair, Manitoba People * ...

ZX Spectrum The ZX Spectrum () is an 8-bit computing, 8-bit home computer that was developed by Sinclair Research. It was released in the United Kingdom on 23 April 1982, and became Britain's best-selling microcomputer. Referred to during development as t ...

, not to mention the highly sophisticated

BBC Micro The British Broadcasting Corporation Microcomputer System, or BBC Micro, is a series of microcomputers and associated peripherals designed and built by Acorn Computers in the 1980s for the BBC Computer Literacy Project. Designed with an emphas ...

. Despite this, three million units were sold worldwide with a long production life of eight years. It inspired an East German version with

Z80 The Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor introduced by Zilog as the startup company's first product. The Z80 was conceived by Federico Faggin in late 1974 and developed by him and his 11 employees starting in early 1975. The first working samples were ...

clone processors. In 1985, Sugar had another major breakthrough with the launch of the

Amstrad PCW The Amstrad PCW series is a range of personal computers produced by British company Amstrad from 1985 to 1998, and also sold under licence in Europe as the "Joyce" by the German electronics company Schneider in the early years of the series' life. ...

8256

word processor A word processor (WP) is a device or computer program that provides for input, editing, formatting, and output of text, often with some additional features. Word processor (electronic device), Early word processors were stand-alone devices ded ...

which retailed at over £300, but was still considerably cheaper than rival machines (such as the Apple Macintosh Plus, which retailed at $2599). In 1986 Amstrad bought the rights to the Sinclair computer product line and produced two more ZX Spectrum models in a similar style to their CPC machines. It also developed the

PC1512 The Amstrad PC1512 was Amstrad's mostly IBM PC-compatible computer system, first manufactured in 1986. It was later succeeded by the PC1640. Features Whereas IBM's PC (and almost all PC compatibles) had a power supply in a corner of the main cas ...

, a

PC compatible IBM PC compatible computers are similar to the original IBM PC, XT, and AT, all from computer giant IBM, that are able to use the same software and expansion cards. Such computers were referred to as PC clones, IBM clones or IBM PC clones. ...

computer, which became quite popular in Europe and was the first in a line of Amstrad PCs. In 1988,

Stewart Alsop II Stewart Johonnot Oliver Alsop, Jr. (born January 7, 1952) is an American investor who is a partner in Alsop Louie Partners, a venture capital firm. He was a general partner with New Enterprise Associates in Menlo Park, California. He was an edit ...

called Sugar and

Jack Tramiel Jack Tramiel ( ; born Idek Trzmiel; December 13, 1928 – April 8, 2012) was an American businessman and Holocaust survivor, best known for founding Commodore International. The Commodore PET, VIC-20 and Commodore 64 are some home compute ...

"the world's two leading business-as-war entrepreneurs". The 1990s proved a difficult time for the company. The launch of a range of business PCs was marred by unreliable hard disks (supplied by Seagate), causing high levels of customer dissatisfaction and damaging Amstrad's reputation in the personal computer market, from which it never recovered. Subsequently, Seagate was ordered to pay Amstrad $153 million in damages for lost revenue. This was later reduced by $22 million in an out of court settlement. In the early 1990s, Amstrad began to focus on portable computers rather than desktop computers. Also, in 1990, Amstrad entered the gaming market with the

Amstrad GX4000 The GX4000 is a video game console that was manufactured by Amstrad. It was the company's short-lived attempt to enter the games console market. The console was released in Europe in 1990 and was an upgraded design based on the then still-popular ...

, but it was a commercial failure, largely because there was only a poor selection of games available. Additionally, it was immediately superseded by the Japanese consoles:

Mega Drive The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master System. Sega released it in 1988 in Japan a ...

and

Super NES The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES), commonly shortened to Super NES or Super Nintendo, is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in E ...

, which both had a much more comprehensive selection of games. In 1993, Amstrad released the

PenPad The term PenPad was used as a product name for a number of Pen computing products by different companies in the 1980s and 1990s. The earliest was the ''Penpad'' series of products by Pencept, such as the PenPad M200 handwriting terminal, and the P ...

, a PDA, and bought into Betacom and

Viglen Viglen Ltd provides IT products and services, including storage systems, servers, workstations and data/voice communications equipment and services. History The company was formed in 1975, by Vigen Boyadjian. During the 1980s, the company s ...

in order to focus more on telecommunications rather than computers. Amstrad released the first of its combined telephony and e-mail devices, called the ''

e-m@iler The Amstrad E-mailer (often stylized as E-m@iler or written as Emailer or Em@iler) is a Personal Communication Centre that is a landline phone device, launched in March 2000. History Design and release The idea for the Amstrad E-mailer was c ...

'', followed by the ''e-m@ilerplus'' in 2002, neither of which sold in great volume. On 31 July 2007, it was announced that broadcaster

had agreed to buy Amstrad for about £125m. At the time of the takeover, Sugar commented that he wished to play a part in the business, saying: "I turn 60 this year and I have had 40 years of hustling in the business, but now I have to start thinking about my team of loyal staff, many of whom have been with me for many years." On 2 July 2008 it was announced that Sugar was standing down from Amstrad as chairman, to focus on his other business interests.

Tottenham Hotspur

After a take-over battle with

Robert Maxwell Ian Robert Maxwell (born Ján Ludvík Hyman Binyamin Hoch; 10 June 1923 – 5 November 1991) was a Czechoslovak-born British media proprietor, member of parliament (MP), suspected spy, and fraudster. Early in his life, Maxwell escaped from N ...

, Sugar teamed up with

Terry Venables Terence Frederick Venables (born 6 January 1943), often referred to as El Tel, is an English former football player and manager, and an author. During the 1960s and '70s, he played for various clubs including Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and Queen ...

and bought

football club in June 1991. Although Sugar's initial investment helped ease the financial troubles the club was suffering at the time, his treatment of Tottenham as a business venture and not a footballing one made him an unpopular figure among the Spurs fans. In Sugar's nine years as chairman, Tottenham Hotspur did not finish in the top six in the league and won just one trophy, the 1999

Football League Cup The EFL Cup (referred to historically, and colloquially, as the League Cup), currently known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons, is an annual knockout competition and major trophy in men's domestic football in England. Organised by the ...

. After Venables was sacked by Sugar, Venables appealed to the high courts for reinstatement. A legal battle for the club took place over the summer, which Sugar won (see ''

Re Tottenham Hotspur plc ''Re Tottenham Hotspur plc'' 9941 BCLC 655 is a UK company law case concerning unfair prejudice under s 459 of the Companies Act 1985, now s 994 Companies Act 2006. Facts In 1993 both Mr Alan Sugar and Mr Terry Venables had a 50-50 interest in ...

994 Year 994 ( CMXCIV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * September 15 – Battle of the Orontes: Fatimid forces, under Turkish gener ...

1 BCLC 655). The decision to sack Venables angered many of Tottenham fans, and Sugar later said, "I felt as though I'd killed

Bambi ''Bambi'' is a 1942 American animated drama film directed by David Hand (supervising a team of sequence directors), produced by Walt Disney and based on the 1923 book ''Bambi, a Life in the Woods'' by Austrian author and hunter Felix Salten ...

." In 1992, he was the only representative of the then big five (

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

, Everton,

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

Manchester United Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

and

Tottenham Tottenham () is a town in North London, England, within the London Borough of Haringey. It is located in the ceremonial county of Greater London. Tottenham is centred north-northeast of Charing Cross, bordering Edmonton to the north, Waltham ...

) who voted in favour of

Sky The sky is an unobstructed view upward from the surface of the Earth. It includes the atmosphere and outer space. It may also be considered a place between the ground and outer space, thus distinct from outer space. In the field of astronomy, ...

's bid for Premier League television rights. The other four voted in favour of

ITV ITV or iTV may refer to: ITV *Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of: ** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...

's bid, as it had promised to show big fives games more often. At the time of the vote, Sugar's company Amstrad was developing satellite dishes for Sky, though Sugar had declared this prior to the vote. During negotiations, Sugar called Sky CEO

Sam Chisholm Samuel Hewlings Chisholm AO (8 October 1939 – 9 July 2018) was a New Zealand-born Australian media executive who was a significant figure in the Australian media. Career Chisholm attended King's College, Auckland. Chisholm had been f ...

and angrily ordered him to "blow TVout of the water" with a much higher bid. In 1994, Sugar financed the transfers of three stars of the 1994 World Cup:

Ilie Dumitrescu Ilie Dumitrescu (; born 6 January 1969) is a Romanian football manager and former professional footballer. As a player, he was a winger who notably played in the Premier League with Tottenham Hotspur and West Ham United, and in La Liga with S ...

, Gica Popescu, and most notably

Jürgen Klinsmann Jürgen Klinsmann (, born 30 July 1964) is a German professional football manager and former player. Klinsmann played for several prominent clubs in Europe including VfB Stuttgart, Inter Milan, Monaco, Tottenham Hotspur, and Bayern Munich. He ...

, who had an excellent first season in English football, being named Footballer of the Year. Because Spurs had not qualified for the

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store Solid, solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, porcela ...

, Klinsmann decided to invoke an opt-out clause in his contract and left for Bayern Munich in the summer of 1995. Sugar appeared on television holding the last shirt Klinsmann wore for Spurs and said he wouldn't wash his car with it. He referred to foreigners coming into the

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...

at high wages as "Carlos Kickaballs". Klinsmann retaliated by calling Sugar "a man without honour", and said: "He only ever talks about money. He never talks about the game. I would say there is a big question mark over whether Sugar's heart is in the club and in football. The big question is what he likes more, the business or the football?" Klinsmann re-signed for Tottenham on loan in December 1997. In October 1998, former Tottenham striker

Teddy Sheringham Edward Paul "Teddy" Sheringham, MBE (born 2 April 1966) is an English football manager and former player. He played as a forward, mostly as a second striker, in a 24-year professional career. Sheringham began his career at Millwall, where ...

released his autobiography, in which he attacked Sugar as the reason he left Tottenham in 1997. Sheringham said Sugar had accused him of feigning injury during a long spell on the sidelines during the 1993/1994 season. He wrote that Sugar had refused to give him the five-year contract he wanted, as he had not believed Sheringham would still get into the Tottenham team when he was 36. Sheringham returned to Tottenham after his spell at

and continued to start for the first team until he was released in the summer of 2003, at age 37. Sheringham said that Sugar lacked ambition and was hypocritical. As an example, Sugar asked him for recommendations of players; when Sheringham suggested

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

midfielder

Paul Ince Paul Emerson Carlyle Ince (; born 21 October 1967) is an English professional football manager and former player who is the current manager of EFL Championship side Reading. A former midfielder, Ince played professionally from 1982 to 2007, st ...

, Sugar refused because he did not want to spend £4 million on a player who would soon be 30. After Sheringham left Spurs, Sugar approved the signing of

Les Ferdinand Leslie Ferdinand MBE (born 8 December 1966) is an English football coach, former professional footballer and television pundit, who is currently the director of football at Queens Park Rangers. A striker, his playing career included notable sp ...

, aged 31, for a club record £6 million, on higher wages than Sheringham had wanted. Sugar appointed seven managers in his time at Spurs. The first was

Peter Shreeves Peter Shreeves (born 30 November 1940) is a Welsh former football player, manager and coach. Career Shreeves was born in Neath in South Wales where his mother had been evacuated to during the early stages of World War II, but was brought up i ...

, followed by the dual management team of

Doug Livermore Douglas Ernest Livermore (born 27 December 1947) is a former professional footballer and manager. Playing career Livermore began his career with Liverpool F.C., Liverpool where he came through the youth system to eventually sign professional f ...

and

Ray Clemence Raymond Neal Clemence, (5 August 1948 – 15 November 2020) was an England international football goalkeeper and part of the Liverpool team of the 1970s. He is one of only 31 players to have made over 1,000 career appearances, and holds the ...

, former Spurs midfielder

Osvaldo Ardiles Osvaldo César Ardiles (born 3 August 1952), often referred to in Britain as Ossie Ardiles, is an Argentine football manager, pundit and former midfielder who won the 1978 FIFA World Cup as part of the Argentina national team. He now runs his ...

, and up and coming young manager Gerry Francis. In 1997, Sugar surprised the footballing world by appointing the relatively unknown Swiss manager

Christian Gross Christian Jürgen Gross (born 14 August 1954) is a Swiss football manager and former player who most recently coached Schalke 04. He played as a sweeper and central midfielder. Gross was manager of Basel from 1 July 1999 to 27 May 2009, winning ...

. Gross lasted 9 months as Spurs finished in 14th place in 1998, and began the next season with just 3 points from their opening three games. Sugar next appointed

George Graham George Graham (born 30 November 1944), nicknamed "Stroller", is a Scottish former Association football, football player and manager (association football), manager. In his successful playing career, he made 455 appearances in England's Football ...

, a former player and manager of bitter rivals

. Despite his earning Tottenham's first trophy in 8 years, the Spurs fans never warmed to Graham, partly because of his Arsenal connections. They disliked the negative, defensive style of football which he had Spurs playing; fans claimed it was not the "Tottenham way". In February 2001, after speculation and confirmation on 11 December 2000, Sugar sold his majority stake at Tottenham to leisure group

ENIC Ente Nazionale Industrie Cinematografiche (ENIC) was an Italian film production and distribution entity that operated between 1935 and 1956. It was formed in 1935, taking over the former organisation of Stefano Pittaluga and his Cines company. ...

, selling 27% of the club for £22 million. In June 2007, Sugar sold his 12% remaining shares to ENIC for £25 million, ending his 16-year association with the club. He has described his time at Tottenham as "a waste of my life". Sugar later donated £3 million from the proceeds of the sale of his interests in Tottenham Hotspur to the refurbishment of the

Hackney Empire Hackney Empire is a theatre on Mare Street, in the London Borough of Hackney. Originally designed by Frank Matcham it was built in 1901 as a music hall, and expanded in 2001. Described by ''The Guardian'' as ‘the most beautiful theatre in L ...

in his native East End of London.

''The Apprentice''

Sugar became the star of the

...
reality show ''

'', which has had one series broadcast each year from 2005, in the same role as

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...

in the US version. Sugar fires at least one candidate each week until only one candidate is left. Until 2010, the winner was then employed in his company and since 2011 wins a partnership with Sugar, including his investment of £250,000 to establish their own business. As a condition for appearing in the third series, Sugar placed a requirement that the show be more business-oriented rather than just entertainment and that he should be portrayed in a less harsh light, to counter his somewhat belligerent reputation. He also expressed a desire that the calibre of the candidates should be higher than those who had appeared in the second series (who had come across as manifestly lacklustre) and that the motives of the candidates for participating are scrutinised more carefully, given that certain of the candidates in previous series had used their successful experience in the show as a springboard to advance their own careers (as occurred with

Michelle Dewberry Michelle Louise Faye Dewberry (born 9 October 1979) is a British businesswoman, politician, presenter, and media personality. Dewberry won the second series of British television programme ''The Apprentice''. Early life Dewberry was born a ...

, the winner of the second series, who left Amstrad's employment only 8 months after taking up the job). In September 2013, Sugar lost his

Employment tribunal Employment tribunals are tribunal public bodies in England and Wales and Scotland which have statutory jurisdiction to hear many kinds of disputes between employers and employees. The most common disputes are concerned with unfair dismissal, red ...

counter-claim against Stella English, the 2010 winner of The Apprentice. Sugar has criticised the US version of ''The Apprentice'' because "they've made the fatal error of trying to change things just for the sake of it and it backfired."

''The Celebrity Apprentice Australia''

In September 2020, it was announced that Sugar will be the new CEO on ''

'' on Australia's

, replacing former CEO

Mark Bouris Mark Leigh Bouris is an Australian businessman who is best known as the founder and chairman of 'Wizard Home Loans', Australia's second largest non-bank mortgage lender behind Aussie Home Loans. He is now the chairman of Yellow Brick Road, a b ...

''Young Apprentice''

Young Apprentice ''Young Apprentice'' is a British reality television programme and a spin off of ''The Apprentice'', in which a group of young people compete against each other in a series of business related challenges to win a £25,000 investment from Briti ...

'' (Junior Apprentice in series 1) was a British reality television programme spin-off in which a group of twelve young people, aged 16 and 17, competed to win a £25,000 prize from Sugar. The six-part series began on BBC One and BBC HD on Wednesday, 12 May 2010, and concluded on Thursday, 10 June of the same year. It featured

Nick Hewer Nicholas Radbourn Hewer (born 17 February 1944) is a retired English television presenter, company director (2010) and former public relations consultant. From 2005 to 2014, he appeared as Alan Sugar's adviser in the British television series ...

and

Karren Brady Karren Rita Brady, Baroness Brady, (born 4 April 1969) is a British business executive and television personality. She is a former managing director of Birmingham City F.C. and current vice-chairman of West Ham United F.C., and an aide to Al ...

as Sugar's advisors. Karren Brady made her debut on Junior Apprentice; it aired before she appeared on the adult version. The programme concluded with Sugar awarding the prize fund to 17-year-old Arjun Rajyagor. Tim Ankers finished in second place. The second series started in October 2011, and featured eight episodes and twelve contestants. The series was won by Zara Brownless, with James McCullough as runner-up. Originally proposed in March 2008 and confirmed in June 2009, Junior Apprentice received mostly positive reviews from critics. Sugar's role under

Gordon Brown James Gordon Brown (born 20 February 1951) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party (UK), Leader of the Labour Party from 2007 to 2010. He previously served as Chance ...

's government sparked a debate over the BBC's political impartiality regulations in the run-up to the UK 2010 election, resulting in both Junior Apprentice and the sixth regular edition of The Apprentice being delayed.

Other Television appearances

In May 2008, Sugar made an appearance on ''An Audience Without Jeremy Beadle'' to pay tribute to

Jeremy Beadle Jeremy James Anthony Gibson-Beadle MBE (12 April 1948 – 30 January 2008) was an English television presenter, radio presenter, writer and producer. During the 1980s he was a regular face on British television, and in two years appeared ...

as they were close friends and both appeared on a celebrity special of ''

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? ''Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?'' (often informally called ''Millionaire'') is an international television game show franchise of British origin, created by David Briggs, Mike Whitehill and Steven Knight. In its format, currently owned and ...

'' in 2005. In January 2009,

Fiona Bruce Fiona Elizabeth Bruce (born 25 April 1964) is a British journalist, newsreader, and television presenter. She joined the BBC as a researcher for '' Panorama'' in 1989, and has since become the first female newsreader on the ''BBC News at Ten' ...

presented a

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

documentary entitled ''The Real Sir Alan''. Also in 2009, Sugar appeared in television advertisements for investment bank NS&I and The

Learning and Skills Council The Learning and Skills Council (LSC) was a non-departmental public body jointly sponsored by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) and the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) in England. It closed on 31 Marc ...

talking about apprenticeships. In May 2011, Sugar presented ''Lord Sugar Tackles Football'', a documentary looking into the financial woes of English

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

. In September 2012, Sugar appeared as himself in a cameo in the

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the u ...

episode "

The Power of Three In mathematics, a power of three is a number of the form where is an integer – that is, the result of exponentiation with number 3, three as the Base (exponentiation), base and integer as the exponent. Applications The powers of three ...

". Sugar's cameo was filmed on the set of ''The Apprentice''. In November 2012, Sugar appeared as himself in a cameo in a special episode of ''

EastEnders ''EastEnders'' is a Television in the United Kingdom, British soap opera created by Julia Smith (producer), Julia Smith and Tony Holland which has been broadcast on BBC One since February 1985. Set in the fictional borough of Walford in the Ea ...

'' for '' Children in Need''.

Other ventures

Amsair

Amsair Executive Aviation was founded in 1993, and is run by Sugar's son Daniel Paul Sugar. As with Amstrad, the name Amsair is an acronym taken from the initials of Sugar's name "Alan Michael Sugar Air." Amsair operates a large Cessna fleet, and one

Embraer Legacy 650 The Embraer Legacy 600 is a business jet derivative of the Embraer ERJ 145 family of commercial jet aircraft. Design and development The Legacy 600 (market designation adopted after 2005) is based on the ERJ-135 model. It was launched in 2000 ...

with the registration G-SUGA, offering business and executive jet charters.

Amsprop

Amsprop is a property investment firm owned by Sugar and is now controlled by his son Daniel Paul Sugar. Simon Ambrose, winner of the 2007 series of The Apprentice, started working for Amsprop Estates after the series finished. However, in April 2010, he was reported to be leaving to start his own venture.

Viglen Ltd

Sugar was the owner (and Chairman of the board) of

Ltd, an IT services provider catering primarily to the education and public sector. He resigned his position on 1 July 2009. Following the sale of Amstrad PLC to BSkyB, Viglen was Sugar's sole IT establishment until its sale to XMA in 2014.

Amscreen

Sugar is Chairman of Amscreen, a company run by his eldest son Simon Sugar, specialising in selling advertising space on

digital signage Digital signage is a segment of electronic signage. Digital displays use technologies such as LCD, LED, projection and e-paper to display digital images, video, web pages, weather data, restaurant menus, or text. They can be found in public ...

screens that it provides to retailers, medical centres and leisure venues. ''Apprentice'' winner Yasmina Siadatan worked there, selling into the

NHS The National Health Service (NHS) is the umbrella term for the publicly funded healthcare systems of the United Kingdom (UK). Since 1948, they have been funded out of general taxation. There are three systems which are referred to using the " ...

. The screens use a

Face detection Face detection is a computer technology being used in a variety of applications that identifies human faces in digital images. Face detection also refers to the psychological process by which humans locate and attend to faces in a visual scene. ...

system called OptimEyes to try to identify age and sex of its viewers. In July 2008, Amscreen purchased Comtech M2M, which was founded in September 1992, originally specialising in communications product retailing. This was before entering the M2M market in 1999. On 29 August 2008, Comtech M2M officially changed names to Amscreen Limited.

YouView

On 7 March 2011, Sugar replaced

Kip Meek Kip Meek (born 18 April 1955), full name Kingsley John Neville Meek, is a British businessperson specialising in media and telecommunication. Career Kip Meek held board level roles at Ofcom from 2003 until 2007. He joined Ofcom as senior partner ...

on the board of the

...
initiated

IPTV Internet Protocol television (IPTV) is the delivery of television content over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. This is in contrast to delivery through traditional terrestrial, satellite, and cable television formats. Unlike downloaded media, ...

project known as

YouView YouView is a hybrid television platform in the United Kingdom developed by YouView TV Ltd., a partnership of four broadcasters, the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5; and three telecommunications operators, Arqiva, BT Group and TalkTalk Gro ...

(formerly known as Project Canvas) which is also backed by

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

and Channel 5 and broadband providers including BT and TalkTalk. Sugar was paid £500,000 for chairing YouView for the year ending March 2012.

Political involvement

In February 2009, the ''

Evening Standard The ''Evening Standard'', formerly ''The Standard'' (1827–1904), also known as the ''London Evening Standard'', is a local free daily newspaper in London, England, published Monday to Friday in tabloid format. In October 2009, after be ...

'' journalist

Andrew Gilligan Andrew Paul Gilligan (born 22 November 1968) is a British policy adviser and former transport adviser to Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister between 2019-22. Until July 2019, he was senior correspondent of ''The Sunday Times'' and had also served ...

claimed that Sugar had been approached to be the

Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

candidate for

Mayor of London The mayor of London is the chief executive of the Greater London Authority. The role was created in 2000 after the 1998 Greater London Authority referendum, Greater London devolution referendum in 1998, and was the first Directly elected may ...

in 2012. Sugar subsequently ridiculed the claim in an interview with ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

''. But, during Prime Minister

's cabinet reshuffle on 5 June 2009, the BBC reported that Sugar would be given a

life peerage In the United Kingdom, life peers are appointed members of the peerage whose titles cannot be inherited, in contrast to hereditary peers. In modern times, life peerages, always created at the rank of baron, are created under the Life Peerages A ...

and had been offered a job as the government's " Enterprise Champion". On 7 June 2009, Sugar sought to clarify the non-political nature of his appointment. He stated that he would not be joining the government, that the appointment was politically neutral, and that all he wanted to do was help businesses and entrepreneurs. On 20 July 2009, he was made Baron Sugar, ''of Clapton, in the

London Borough of Hackney London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

''. He made his

maiden speech A maiden speech is the first speech given by a newly elected or appointed member of a legislature or parliament. Traditions surrounding maiden speeches vary from country to country. In many Westminster system governments, there is a convention th ...

in the House of Lords on 25 November 2009. In August 2014, Sugar was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to ''

'' expressing their hope that Scotland would vote to remain part of the United Kingdom in September's referendum on that issue. From 1997 until 2015, Sugar was a member of the Labour Party and also one of its largest donors. On 11 May 2015, four days after the

2015 United Kingdom general election The 2015 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday, 7 May 2015 to elect 650 members to the House of Commons. It was the first and only general election held at the end of a Parliament under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011. Loca ...

, he announced that he was leaving the party. He issued a statement to say: Before the

2016 London mayoral election The 2016 London mayoral election was held on 5 May 2016 to elect the Mayor of London, on the same day as the London Assembly election. It was the fifth election to the position of mayor, which was created in 2000 after a referendum in Greate ...

, Sugar claimed that he is popular politically, and repeatedly urged the public to not vote for

Sadiq Khan Sadiq Aman Khan (; born 8 October 1970) is a British politician serving as Mayor of London since 2016. He was previously Member of Parliament (MP) for Tooting from 2005 until 2016. A member of the Labour Party, Khan is on the party's sof ...

. Khan won. For the

United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, 2016 The United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, commonly referred to as the EU referendum or the Brexit referendum, took place on 23 June 2016 in the United Kingdom (UK) and Gibraltar to ask the electorate whether the country shoul ...

, he endorsed the "Remain" campaign. In May 2017, Sugar endorsed

Theresa May Theresa Mary May, Lady May (; née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2016 to 2019. She previously served in David Cameron's cab ...

for the

2017 United Kingdom general election The 2017 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 8 June 2017, two years after the previous general election in 2015; it was the first since 1992 to be held on a day that did not coincide with any local elections. The governing ...

. During a June 2017 radio interview with LBC's

Nick Ferrari Nicolo Ferrari (born 31 January 1959) is a British host, television presenter and broadcast journalist. He is best known as the host of the weekday breakfast show on the London-based radio station LBC, with 1.5 million weekly listeners. He al ...

, Sugar said when asked about the 2017 election results that "it's very, very surprising. I think I'd join a lot of people when I say the Theresa May and

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...

campaign was very lacking in what they were going to offer the public" and that "

Jeremy Corbyn Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (; born 26 May 1949) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020. On the political left of the Labour Party, Corbyn describes himself as a socialist ...

did a very good job wooing the young and educated people. I would add that those people who voted for him are quite bright and educated, but also not very experienced in life". On 31 March 2018, after complaints from Labour politicians, Sugar deleted a tweet showing an edited image of Labour leader

in a car with

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...

. The incident occurred after Corbyn said the party "must do better" in resolving the party's problems with antisemitism. Shadow Chancellor

John McDonnell John Martin McDonnell (born 8 September 1951) is a British politician who served as Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2015 to 2020. A member of the Labour Party, he has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Hayes and Harlington since 1997. ...

had urged him to "delete and disown" the tweet. Sugar responded that he was "not the originator" and that "There is no smoke without fire in Labour". On 5 April 2018, Sugar published an

ode An ode (from grc, ᾠδή, ōdḗ) is a type of lyric poetry. Odes are elaborately structured poems praising or glorifying an event or individual, describing nature intellectually as well as emotionally. A classic ode is structured in three majo ...

critical of the UK's Labour Party leader

. In December 2018, Sugar announced during a television interview that he would leave Britain if Corbyn became prime minister. Sugar endorsed

Boris Johnson Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (; born 19 June 1964) is a British politician, writer and journalist who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022. He previously served as F ...

during the 2019 Conservative Party leadership election. He later endorsed the

Conservative Party The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right. Political parties called The Conservative P ...

in the 2019 general election.

Personal life

Sugar has stated that he is an

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

, but remains proud of his Jewish heritage. Sugar and his now wife, Ann Simons, a former hairdresser, married on 28 April 1968 at

Great Portland Street Great Portland Street in the West End of London links Oxford Street with Albany Street and the A501 Marylebone Road and Euston Road. A commercial street including some embassies, it divides Fitzrovia, to the east, from Marylebone to the west. ...

, London. They have two sons and a daughter. The couple live in

Chigwell Chigwell is a town and civil parish in the Epping Forest District of Essex, England. It is part of the urban and metropolitan area of London, and is adjacent to the northern boundary of Greater London. It is on the Central line of the Lond ...

, Essex. Sugar owns a four-seat

Cirrus SR22 The Cirrus SR22 is a single-engine four- or five-seat composite aircraft built from 2001 by Cirrus Aircraft of Duluth, Minnesota. It is a development of the Cirrus SR20, with a larger wing, higher fuel capacity, and a more powerful, 310-horsepo ...

aircraft and a 13-seat

jet. During an attempted landing in his Cirrus at the grass airfield

City Airport Manchester City Airport is an airport in Barton-upon-Irwell, Greater Manchester, England, west of Manchester. Formerly known as Barton Aerodrome and City Airport Manchester, It is known by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) as Manchester/Barton. The U ...

on 5 July 2008, Sugar overshot the runway after touchdown due to poor weather and wet field conditions. No injuries were sustained, although the plane was slightly damaged and consequently grounded. Sugar is a prominent supporter and former owner of

football club. In February 2009, it was reported that Sugar had initiated legal proceedings against '' The Sun'' newspaper following a report that he had been named on a "hit list" of British Jews in response to Israel's ongoing military operation in Gaza. The threats are alleged to have been made by Glen Jenvey, the source of the original story in ''The Sun'', who posted to a Muslim website under a false identity. On 10 June 2020, Sugar, a pilot since 1975, announced on Twitter that he was taking delivery of a new 2020

Cirrus SR22T The Cirrus SR22 is a single-engine four- or five-seat composite material, composite aircraft built from 2001 by Cirrus Aircraft of Duluth, Minnesota. It is a development of the Cirrus SR20, with a larger wing, higher fuel capacity, and a more p ...

single-engine aircraft from the United States where he owns a

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

home and multiple boats, including a refurbished one named ''Little Tub'' and a

superyacht A superyacht or megayacht is a large and luxurious pleasure vessel. There are no official or agreed upon definitions for such yachts, but these terms are regularly used to describe professionally crewed motor or sailing yachts, ranging from to ...

. In 2015, Sugar had an estimated fortune of £1.04 billion (US$1.58 billion). In December 2020, he announced that both his brother and sister had died from

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. In February 2022, 70-year-old Patrick Gomes was jailed for three years and six months for sending antisemitic death threats to Sugar, in response to him speaking about antisemitism in the Labour Party.

Honours and philanthropy

Sugar was

knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...

in the 2000 New Year Honours "for services to the Home Computer and Electronics Industry". He holds two honorary Doctorates of Science, awarded in 1988 by City University and in 2005 by

Brunel University Brunel University London is a public research university located in the Uxbridge area of London, England. It was founded in 1966 and named after the Victorian engineer and pioneer of the Industrial Revolution, Isambard Kingdom Brunel. In June 1 ...

. He is a philanthropist for charities such as

Jewish Care Jewish Care is a British charity, working mainly in London and South East England, providing health and social care support services for the Jewish community. The charity runs over 70 centres and services which include care homes, community centr ...

and

Great Ormond Street Hospital Great Ormond Street Hospital (informally GOSH or Great Ormond Street, formerly the Hospital for Sick Children) is a children's hospital located in the Bloomsbury area of the London Borough of Camden, and a part of Great Ormond Street Hospit ...

, and donated £200,000 to the British Labour Party in 2001. Sugar was created a

life peer In the United Kingdom, life peers are appointed members of the peerage whose titles cannot be inherited, in contrast to hereditary peers. In modern times, life peerages, always created at the rank of baron, are created under the Life Peerages ...

as Baron Sugar, ''of Clapton in the

'' on 20 July 2009. On 29 October 2015, Sugar was listed by UK-based company Richtopia at number 5 in the list of 100 Most Influential British Entrepreneurs. In 2017 he ranked number 1 in the ''Essex Power 100'' list and was named the most powerful person in Essex.

Controversy

Sex discrimination law

Sugar has been accused of having an "outdated" attitude towards women. Regarding the 1970s UK law which states that it is discriminatory and hence illegal for women to be asked at interview whether they plan to have children,Section 6 o
the Act
determines general illegality of discrimination against women in obtaining employment. Sugar is quoted as saying "These laws are counter-productive for women, that's the bottom line. You're not allowed to ask, so it's easy – just don't employ them. It will get harder to get a job as a woman."

Tweets

On 30 September 2013, Sugar tweeted a picture of Chinese child crying 'because he was told off for leaving production line of iPhone 5'. The message was investigated by the Merseyside police force's specialist hate crime investigation team, who decided that it should be classed as a "hate incident" although no crime had taken place. On 20 June 2018, Sugar tweeted a picture of the

Senegal national football team The Senegal national football team ( French: ''Équipe de football du Senegal''), nicknamed the ''Lions of Teranga'', represents Senegal in international association football and is operated by the Senegalese Football Federation. One of Africa' ...

edited next to images of fake handbags and sunglasses, claiming that some of the players looked just like hawkers he had encountered in

Marbella Marbella ( , , ) is a city and municipality in southern Spain, belonging to the province of Málaga in the autonomous community of Andalusia. It is part of the Costa del Sol and is the headquarters of the Association of Municipalities of the r ...

. He later defended his tweet as a joke before taking it down, after accusations of racism.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Sugar, Alan 1947 births Living people English aviators English autobiographers English football chairmen and investors English people of Russian-Jewish descent English people of Polish-Jewish descent English billionaires English television personalities English atheists Jewish atheists British real estate businesspeople British billionaires Knights Bachelor People from Hackney Central The Apprentice (British TV series) BBC people Labour Party (UK) life peers Tottenham Hotspur F.C. directors and chairmen Labour Party (UK) people 20th-century English businesspeople 21st-century English businesspeople Jewish British politicians Businesspeople awarded knighthoods Life peers created by Elizabeth II