Anthony Howard Wilson, also known as Tony Wilson, was born at Hope Hospital, Salford, on 20 February 1950. He was the only child of Sydney Wilson (1917–1997), tobacconist, and his wife, Doris Emily, née Knupfer (1904–1975). His parents ran a chain of tobacconist shops, including the original shop in Salford, and moved to live in Marple, Cheshire, in 1955.

Wilson attended De La Salle Catholic boys’ grammar school in Salford from 1961 to 1968. He read English at Jesus College, Cambridge, from 1968 to 1971. At Cambridge he was involved in student journalism and left-wing politics, including becoming the editor of Varsity, and participating in the Cambridge Union Society and in the Cambridge Sit Ins of 1968. On graduating from Jesus College, Wilson joined Independent Television News (ITN) as a trainee journalist. He left ITN in 1978 to join Granada Television in Manchester, where he became a reporter for the early evening magazine programme, Granada Reports. He worked for Granada Reports until the mid-1980s, returning for a second stint as a presenter in the early-2000s before being dismissed for swearing on air.

On Granada Reports, Wilson was known for his active reports into activities including hang-gliding, abseiling and parachuting but, more significantly for his second career as a music entrepreneur, also for his presentation of a 10-minute arts and entertainment slot at the end of the Friday edition of Granada Reports. The popularity of the slot, What’s On, led to a 30-minute late night programme, So It Goes, in July 1976. The first series of So It Goes featured the Sex Pistols performing Anarchy in the UK in their television debut. Wilson had seen the band perform live at one of two gigs at the Lesser Free Trade Hall in June 1976 and had pushed for them to be on the show. The second series of So It Goes included performances by the Clash, the Jam, and Siouxsie and the Banshees. The performance by Iggy Pop during the third series of So It Goes caused it to be cancelled by Granada Television. Wilson continued to work as a presenter on Granada Reports, and went on to front other programmes for Granada, including The Other Side of Midnight, Flying Start, Fast Forward and Job Watch. Furthering his television career, in 1987, Wilson joined Channel 4 as the presenter of the late night discussion programme After Dark. Wilson was known up until this point as Tony Wilson, but the critical acclaim garnered by After Dark and its national profile encouraged him to adopt the name Anthony H Wilson professionally.

Around the time that So It Goes was cancelled at the end of the 1970s, Wilson’s friend, the actor Alan Erasmus, suggested that Wilson joined him in co-managing a new band led by the guitarist Vini Reilly. The band eventually became known as Durutti Column. For Wilson, this was an opportunity to become more involved in the punk-inspired creative scene that was developing in Manchester. In April 1978, Wilson and Erasmus attended a battle of the bands style contest at the Manchester night club Rafters on Oxford Road. Here they encountered Joy Division and their manager Rob Gretton. It is widely acknowledged that Wilson’s support for Joy Division helped them to become the defining band of the post-punk era.

From May to June 1978, Wilson and Erasmus hired a social club in Hulme, Manchester, known variously as The Russell Club and the Public Service Vehicle Club. Here they put on four gigs under the name The Factory, featuring bands they were either managing or interested in supporting. Around the time of the first gig, graphic design student Peter Saville approached Wilson about designing a poster for the gig. Wilson, Erasmus and Saville eventually became the first directors of Factory Records, later joined by Joy Division manager Rob Gretton and music producer Martin Hannett. Factory Records was established to enable the bands that Wilson was working with to release records without needing to sign to a major label. The first release, A Factory Sample, released in January 1979, featured four artists who had performed at The Factory: Cabaret Voltaire, the comedian John Dowie, Durutti Column, and Joy Division. Wilson paid for the pressing of the double 7 inch EP using money he inherited from his mother. Wilson’s position as a local news reported and television presenter, as well as his financial stability, set his position within Factory as the strategist and publicist. Erasmus carried out day-to-day management of the company from his flat on 86 Palatine Road (the original business address of Factory Records), and Saville developed the modernist aesthetic for the company.

Wilson saw Factory as the basis for the creative regeneration of post-industrial Manchester. In 1981, Wilson began developing an idea to establish in Manchester a New York style night club. The Haçienda opened in a former yacht showroom on Whitworth Street, Manchester, on 21 May 1982. Costing almost five times the projected £70,000 conversion costs, the club operated at a loss throughout its existence, bolstered only by New Order’s commercial success. Despite this, Wilson and the Haçienda are recognised as having kick-started the regeneration of the Castlefield area of Manchester.

Wilson became known as Mr Manchester during the 1980s, due to the success of New Order as the foremost act on Factory Records and Wilson’s ambitions for the cultural reinvention of Manchester. By the end of the 1980s, New Order were joined by the Happy Mondays as the biggest successes on Factory Records, ushering in Manchester’s Baggy era. Factory continued to expand its reach in Manchester with the establishment of Dry bar, co-owned with New Order, on Oldham Street, Manchester. As with his vision for the Haçienda, Wilson and Dry are credited with sparking the regeneration of what is now known as Manchester’s Northern Quarter.

Wilson can be seen as being responsible for the collapse of Factory. He indulged the Happy Mondays in their excesses, allowing the recording of their fourth album to run massively over budget. He resisted, for as long as he could, the closure of the Haçienda despite its troubles with gang-related violence. He also pushed ahead with a new headquarters for Factory, located on Charles Street, Manchester, at a cost of £750,000. In November 1992, Factory declared bankruptcy with debts of £2.5 million. Wilson’s commitment to the radical policy of allowing artists on the Factory Records label to retain the intellectual property rights in their own recordings meant that potential investors in the company rapidly withdrew from negotiations. Factory only introduced formal contracts for artists in late 1988.

Wilson set up a new label, Factory Too, as a subsidiary of Polygram/London Records, the label that acquired the New Order and Joy Division catalogue from Factory. This was a short-lived enterprise.

Wilson was married to Lindsay Reade from 1977 to 1983, to Hilary Sherlock, with whom he had two children, Oliver and Isabel, from 1984 to 1987, and was in a long term relationship with Yvette Livesey from 1987 until his death in 2007.

Wilson was diagnosed with kidney cancer in December 2006 and succumbed to the illness at the Christie Hospital, Withington, Manchester, on 10 August 2007. He was buried in the Southern cemetery, Chorlton-cum-Hardy, following a funeral service at St Mary's Roman Catholic Church, Manchester, on 20 August. His coffin was given the Factory catalogue number FAC 501.