MICHAEL O'LEARY Airline Executive In his jeans-wearing corporate iconoclasm, O'Leary resembles fellow airline entrepreneur Richard Branson. While most carriers were paralyzed by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, O'Leary, 40, chief executive of Dublin-based Ryanair, jumped into action, slashing fares for all seats on his no-frills airline to $15, selling a record number of tickets in one week. He took over the money-losing Ryanair in 1990 and made it profitable within a year. Even as others in the industry were cutting back earlier this year, Ryanair was growing, making short jaunts between 55 European locations and doing away with in-flight services from...
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