Who are the Tessier-Ashpools?

The Tessier-Ashpools are an eccentric and extremely rich family who live and own most of Freeside, a space station orbiting the Earth. The family is run much like a corporation, and they both clone themselves and employ cyrogenics in order to keep a continuous family control over their empire. The Tessier-Ashpools created Wintermute, the AI that is backing Armitage.