Michael Colglazier

Michael A. Colglazier, born in 1967, is an American business executive and the president and chief executive officer of Virgin Galactic, the California-based commercial space tourism company, which he joined in July 2020. He was born in Lafayette, Indiana, took a bachelor's degree in industrial engineering at Stanford in 1989 and an MBA at Harvard Business School in 1994. He spent most of his earlier career at The Walt Disney Company, starting in corporate strategic planning in 1989, running Epcot as general manager from 1994 to 2000, serving as vice president of Disney's Animal Kingdom, and becoming president of Disneyland Resort in 2013. In 2018 he became president of Disney Parks Asia Pacific and then of Disney Parks International, which he left in July 2020. At Virgin Galactic he succeeded founder George Whitesides, and the company flew its first commercial spaceflight, Galactic 01, on 29 June 2023.