CEO Nearly Bares All in Cell Phone Promotion

The call for greater transparency by corporate CEOs was taken to extreme lengths when Virgin Group Chairman Sir Richard Branson took off his clothes to draw attention to a new business venture.

Dangling from a crane above New York’s Times Square, Branson whipped off his clothes--actually, he was wearing a flesh-toned body suit underneath--as part of a stunt introducing Virgin Mobile USA, a youth-oriented mobile phone company that his company launched nationwide this week.

He was playing off the marketing theme that Virgin’s prepaid U.S. mobile service has “nothing to hide” in the way of costly monthly service charges.

Virgin Mobile USA, in its new partnership with MTV, will market mobile phones services targeting mobile phone users under the age of 30, and will allow customers to download short music clips known as “ringing tones,” play games and eventually tune in to songs and video clips.