Sir Richard Branson has stepped back from day-to-day management of Virgin, handing over executive control of his empire to a hand-picked committee of key lieutenants.

The 57-year-old billionaire has taken to presenting himself publicly as the “founder” of Virgin, as he focuses on promotional activities and development of new businesses.

Sir Richard has been winding down his hands-on involvement in Virgin for a number of years, but has now severed executive control completely.

While he remains chairman of Virgin Group, Stephen Murphy, an accountant who has been with Virgin since 1993, is the group’s chief executive and chairman of Virgin Atlantic. Gordon McCallum, a former consultant at McKinsey, is responsible for new ventures.

Mr Murphy said: “Richard is not involved day-to-day now, but he is there to keep us on the right road. He agitates and gives us ideas and keeps the group fresh and active.”

The change in executive management at Virgin is seen as the first step in a strategic shift, as the group seeks to build the brand beyond the personality of Sir Richard.

Virgin now wants to position itself as a consumer-oriented private equity group, focusing on just a few profitable business areas rather than trying to make every one of the founder’s dreams a commercial reality. Virgin operates more than 200 businesses, only 30 of which the group itself classifies as “significant”.

While Sir Richard’s reputation has been built on the success of businesses such as the airline Virgin Atlantic, it has also been marked by a combination of fanfare and failure in sectors such as bridal wear and drinks.

Virgin Altantic, Virgin Rail, Virgin Media and the other divisions will continue to be run by their own management teams, while the group and its assets will be overseen by a seven-strong investment committee.

In the past two weeks, Sir Richard has been in the United States to launch the Virgin America airline and in Malaysia to buy a 20 per cent stake in Air Asia Express.

However, Virgin’s investment committee has started to put together a succession strategy for when Sir Richard, who is worth an estimated £4 billion, is no longer involved at all.

One question hovering over the future of the group is the possibility of a family succession: Sam Branson, Sir Richard’s 21-year-old son, has just finished nine months working at Virgin Media with one of the group’s most trusted brand managers. Dr Holly Branson, 24, is also expected to join the group’s new health sciences division after working in the National Health Service.

The possibility of another Branson taking charge, though, is a long way off. In the meantime, Virgin is looking to move beyond the traditional markets where it is well known after more than two decades of Sir Richard’s hot-air ballooning and other escapades.

Mr Murphy said: “We are working methodically to position the brand as being separate to Richard. In the US, there is greater perception of Virgin and Richard being separate because they have got more of a cult of business celebrity. The next generation also has a much lower level of aware-ness. But we do not feel we have accelerate the disassociation artificially.”

Sir Richard founded Virgin in 1970 as a mail-order record store and added a recording studio in 1972. The label’s first major hit was Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells, which sold over five million copies.

The Virgin Group encompasses about 200 companies in 30 countries and had revenues, from all branded divisions, of about £10 billion in 2006. It is a privately held group, based in the British Virgin Islands, and does not reveal profits.