by Robert Charles Alexander
Most people would be happy to have created and run one successful global company, in their life. Tom Misner has formed several, starting with SAE Institute which had fifty-five campuses in twenty-two different countries when he sold it to Navitas plc for hundreds of millions of dollars.
He then formed Skyborne, one of the largest aviation training companies in the world with bases in USA and UK, and which has recently placed orders for its 100th Piper training aircraft.
Not satisfied with those, Tom is a partner with Universal Music in Abbey Road Institute, the world’s premier specialist music production school and the training ground for the next generation of music producers and sound engineers. Utilising the world famous Abbey Road recording studios, famous for The Beatles of course, as well as Angel Studios, both in London, Abbey Road Institute has satellite studios in Sydney, Miami, Paris, Amsterdam and Johannesburg.
He also owns Studios 301, based in Sydney, the longest-running professional recording studio in the southern hemisphere, and the largest studio complex in Australia.
Tom has a vast worldwide property and business portfolio, and even owns his own distillery in Monaco which, for the past few years has served as a home and business base for him and his family.
With philanthropic interests close to his heart, he created The Misner Foundation which supports various charitable interests.
Tom relaxes with his cars, boats and aircraft, and is never far from one of his many guitars.
Surrounded by his family, and dogs, Tom’s activities have not diminished with age as he approached his seventieth birthday in 2025, and in fact has just completed a fifty-year project for a Broadway musical entitled ‘Madman – The Musical’.
Despite living with onset Parkinson's Disease for the past ten years, Tom is in discussions with a production company for a Misner-Empire television/film mini-series.
When The Misner Factor was published in 2003, it asked the question: Have you ever wanted to be a billionaire?
Now, The Misner Legacy explains over two volumes the life story of Tom Misner, the family man, the business man, the billionaire and his legacy.
This the rest of his story.
When The Misner Factor was published in 2003, it asked the question:
Have you ever wanted to be a billionaire?
Now, The Misner Legacy delves deeper into the life and work of the enigma that is Tom Misner, explaining in two volumes the family man, the business man, the billionaire and his legacy.
This then, is part two of the rest of his story.
Publisher: DMP (January 31, 2025)
Pages: 305 pages
Illustrations: 64 pages (B&W and Colour)
Language: English
Type: Biography
ISBN-13: 978-1-7399493-4-1
Tom Misner founded The School of Audio Engineering in Sydney, Australia in 1976. SAE was the first institute of its kind in the world to offer professional audio engineering training, and following international expansion into England (1984), Germany (1986), France (1992) and the USA (1994), the company branched out into multimedia, digital film, graphic design, mastering, and games design. SAE was also the first school of its kind to offer Batchelor Degrees and Master’s Degrees in a variety of disciplines.
By the time he came to sell the company in 2011 for A$289m, it was the largest private education facility in the world, with fifty-seven campuses on five continents, tens of thousands of students, and an alumni working in every aspect of the professional audio, film, graphic design and multimedia industry.
Recognised worldwide as a pioneer for his education pedagogy, Misner went on to found the Abbey Road Institute, a professional audio engineering and mastering facility based at the world famous Abbey Road Studios in London, with similar schools in Sydney, Amsterdam, Paris, Miami, Johannesburg and Frankfurt. Among his assets are Studios 301, based in Sydney, the longest-running professional studio complex in the southern hemisphere, with additional locations in London and Cologne.
Today, Tom Misner lives a comfortable life jetting between Europe and Australia. His wide and varied business interests are combined with a large property portfolio, and despite rapidly approaching his seventieth birthday, he keeps as busy as ever.
Even the onset of Parkinson’s Disease, diagnosed in 2015, has not slowed his appetite for creating a successful company.
Tom enjoys a passion for expensive cars, boats and aircraft; but relaxes simply by playing the guitar, surrounded by his wife and children.
Robert Charles Alexander is an author, lawyer, civil and commercial mediator, and a legal and political consultant.
Born in Hampstead, London England in June 1964, he was educated in the Rudolf Steiner education system where he trained in classical music reading, composition, and arrangement. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Law and a Master’s Degree in International Law from University of Lincoln, and is currently studying for his Ph.D. in Law at Brunel University London.
He most recently worked as a political correspondent for the BBC.
His first book, ‘The Inventor of Stereo – The Life & Works of Alan Dower Blumlein’, was published in August 1999, to worldwide acclaim. It has since been dramatised as a radio programme for BBC Radio 4 broadcast in August 2008, and more recently turned into a major new movie for Universal Pictures Films (due for release in 2026).
His second book, ‘The Misner Factor – The Official History of SAE Institute’, tells the rags to riches story of founder Tom Misner, and was published in July 2003.
His third book, ‘Why We Climb – The Harsh Reality of Modern Expedition Mountaineering’, was co-written with world-renowned American mountaineer Dan Mazur, and documents their attempt to climb Mount Everest in the spring of 2004; it was published in October 2006.
His fourth book, ‘Michael Gerzon – Beyond Psychoacoustics’, tells the complicated story of multi-channel audio reproduction, and follows on directly from his first book; it was published in November 2008.
His fifth book, ‘Newport Arch, Lincoln: a pictorial history, documents two thousand years of one of the City of Lincoln’s iconic Roman monuments; it was published in February 2022.
His sixth and seventh books, ‘The Misner Legacy’ Volume One and Volume Two, directly continue his long-time association with billionaire, Tom Misner.
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Latest Publications
The Misner Legacy - Volume One
Jan 31, 2025
The Misner Legacy - Volume Two
Jan 31, 2025
