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WITH A NET worth of more than $87 billion (€80 billion), Bill Gates is still the richest person in the world.
It wasn’t dumb luck that got him that spot – Gates is a smart, aggressive business mind who was never afraid to make enemies in his drive to take Microsoft to the top.
From Harvard dropout to an Albuquerque rental office to the top of the world, here’s how Bill Gates turned Microsoft into a global force, and became a billionaire in the process.
William Henry Gates III was born in Seattle, Washington on 28 October, 1955, the son of a lawyer and a banking executive. Because of his suffix, his childhood nickname was Trey.
Gates’ parents wanted him to be a lawyer. They enrolled him at the Lakeside School, a Seattle private high school that future Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen also attended.
But Lakeside is also where the course of Gates’ life changed. The Lakeside Mothers Club used cash from a rummage sale to give students access to a Teletype Model 30 computer hooked up to the General Electric mainframe. Gates fell in love with the idea of computers.
In fact, young Gates and Allen were so enamored with computers — programming them, just seeing how they ticked — that they got themselves banned from the Computer Center Corporation mainframe after they used bugs in its code to scam free computing time.
It didn’t take long for Gates to figure out what computers could do for him. Tasked by Lakeside’s administration to help use its computers to schedule classes, he secretly organised the schedules so his classes were full of the girls he was interested in.
Before leaving Lakeside, Gates and Allen had their first business venture together: Traf-O-Data, a computer to read information from city traffic counters and feed it to traffic engineers. It was only moderately successful, but it paved the way for Microsoft.
In 1973, with a score of 1590 out of 1600 on the SAT, Gates enrolled at Harvard. But he never had a major picked out or any real plans — he just ended up spending a lot of time fooling around with the school’s computers.
Still, Gates made lots of connections at Harvard, like fellow student Steve Ballmer. They lived in the same dorm, but only met in an economics class.
In 1974, everything changed. A company called MITS released the Altair 8800 — a breakthrough PC based on the Intel 8080 processor, which made it easier than ever for hobbyists and amateurs to code software.
Gates and Allen called up MITS to ask if they would be interested in a version of the BASIC programming language for the Altair 8800. Not that Gates and Allen had ever laid hands on an Altair 8800, but they wanted to see if it was something for which they could get paid.
Gates and Allen hacked together a version of BASIC for the Altair over a few weeks and flew to the MITS offices in Albuquerque to demonstrate it. MITS was impressed enough to hire the pair — and so, they moved to New Mexico. Gates never finished his studies at Harvard.
The duo named their partnership ‘Micro-soft’ and opened a small office in Albuquerque. By the time the company was released from its corporate overlords at MITS and incorporated in late 1976, it was just plain old Microsoft.
This is also around when young Gates got pulled over for a traffic violation in 1977, resulting in his famous mugshot. In 1979, the company moved to Bellevue, Washington.
In 1980, Gates’ Harvard classmate Ballmer joined up with Microsoft. By 1988, Gates was relying on Ballmer as the company’s executive vice president of sales.
For most of Microsoft’s first few years, the company was focused on writing new programming languages for the very new PC market. Gates was known as a very controlling kind of CEO, personally reviewing every line of code written by its early employees.
It was in 1980 that Gates would break out as a business superstar. When IBM needed an operating system for its forthcoming PC, it turned to Microsoft.
Gates hastily arranged for Microsoft to buy a startup working on an operating system called 86-DOS, or disk operating system. It renamed the software to PC DOS and sold it to IBM for $50,000 (about €45,000)…
…but IBM didn’t ask for the copyright to the software, and Gates never offered. It meant that Microsoft was free to sell MS-DOS, its own version of the operating system.
The success of the IBM PC inspired other tech companies to build their own personal computers, compatible with IBM’s programmes. To do that, they would need to deal with Gates and Microsoft.
It set the tone for the rest of Microsoft’s growth. IBM, Compaq, Dell, and everybody else raced to build the computers — but they all needed DOS, and later, Windows software for the machines to work. It made Microsoft the centre of the so-called PC revolution.
In 1983, Microsoft did $55 million (€50 million) in sales, making it the biggest company in the computer business. On 13 March of that year, Microsoft went public at $21 (€19) per share, getting up to $28 (€25) by the end of the first day. Gates was a billionaire by 1987, at age 31.
Thanks to his shares in Microsoft, Gates was named as the world’s richest person for the first time in 1995, and held the title until 2007. He won back the title in 2009, and then again in 2014 through to the present day.
Windows 1.0, first released in 1985, was also the beginning of Gates’ longtime rivalry with Apple cofounder Steve Jobs. Jobs claimed that Microsoft stole the concept of a windowed, graphical user interface from Apple, and sued for copyright infringement. Microsoft won the case in 1993.
Gates is known as a competitive kind of guy — he doesn’t like to lose. Under his leadership, Microsoft got very aggressive about using the popularity of Windows to push its growing library of other software, especially Office. Windows and Office ended up conquering the lucrative business PC market.
Even internally, Gates was known to verbally spar with his executives, forcing them to defend their decisions. He reportedly routinely interrupted meetings with quips like: “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard!”
Despite being the only real alternative to Microsoft’s dominance, even Apple couldn’t keep the competition up for long. When Steve Jobs came back to Apple as CEO in 1997, he had no choice but to have his rival Gates appear on screen to announce that Microsoft made a company-saving $150 million (€137 million) investment in Apple — to boos from the audience.
And his aggression didn’t make Gates many fans in the techie world: Early memes like this one, portraying Gates as one of Star Trek’s dreaded Borg, were common.
Still, despite his famed long-term vision, Gates didn’t get everything right. The hardcover version of his 1995 book The Road Ahead discounted the potential of the internet — a position he fixed and addressed when it went to paperback.
And in 1998, Gates’ aggressive stance got the company into a lot of trouble when the United States brought an anti-trust case against Microsoft. It was resolved a few years later, with Microsoft agreeing to reform some of its business practices but escaping a potential break-up of the company.
In 2000, Gates decided to step aside and name Ballmer — by this point, the president of Microsoft — the new CEO, while he took a new role as chief software architect. He still remained the face of the company, but he was done as a business leader.
In fact, Ballmer and Gates would routinely star in ridiculous comedy videos intended for Microsoft employees. Like this Austin Powers parody.
In 2006, Gates stepped aside as chief software architect, announcing that while he’d stay at Microsoft part-time as chairman, he’d be focusing on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation — the largest private charitable organisation in the world, managed by Gates, his wife, and famous investor Warren Buffett.
Since then Gates has focused his massive wealth and influence on solving big problems like access to clean water in the developing world, sustainable energy and world hunger.
Plus, Gates keeps busy managing personal investments – like his stake in the Four Seasons hotel chain.
By the end of Steve Jobs’ life, he wasn’t exactly friends with Bill Gates, but they had largely come to terms.
Despite giving away billions in charitable donations, Bill Gates is estimated to have a personal net worth of more than $87 billion (€80 billion).
And in 2014, Gates decided to step down as chairman of Microsoft, taking a new role as technology advisor to Ballmer’s successor, Satya Nadella. And the rest, as they say, is history.
- Matt Weinberger
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She outright lied on sworn testimony- that’s completely unacceptable.
@Ben Fede: I agree. That said if it’s a case that every politician who lied can no longer run… well, may I suggest Mr. O’Dowd lead by example.
@Ben Fede:
Hope she stands.
Hope
@Brinster:
Hope she stands and hope she gets rejected.
Actually hope she gets humiliated.
@Ben Fede: It’s about time that perjury ( in this case lying in the context of an affidavit) should be a criminal offence. That woman will never get elected again. She’s shameful.
@Aine Power: And Josepha M isn’t far behind her. Big attempt by FG at a cover up here. A save Josepha job by Leo. Don’t forget this one.
@Billy McNamara: Absolutely. She advised Maria Bailey that she had a case and it’s reasonable to say would have given her advice on what to ask for and say. Josepha M is now hiding behind privilege and refusing to say anything, I suppose there’s a good side to everything.
@Ben Fede: id say Fg had a good think over the weekend and decided to let Bailey take the hit so as to remove pressure from Madigan…Losing a minister at this point would not look good for our beloved..
@Ben Fede: find a politican who has never lied before …
No October fest or playgrounds for kids because of her and the like of her.
If she said in her affidavit that she could not run for 3months and ran a 10k 3wks later am I mistaken r is that a lie, this was a sworn statement to tell the truth,
@Mary Bermingham: Maybe she meant 3 weeks. Easy mistake to make. Weeks, months, see how similar they sound!
@Mr Bojangles:
Hahahaha, classic.
I live in Dalkey and this is still a very regular topic of conversation. If she does stand she has a very good chance of losing her seat and damaging Mary Mitchell O Connor too. Many local people are also very disgruntled that her father was allowed to stand when it was known he did not have long left and there will be widespread anger if the seat is co-opted to his other daughter.
@Darius Guppy: I hope she runs then and neither of them get reelected. Also must the seat not be filled soon, she wont be able to take it while in the Dail and there’s no election being called just yet.
@Darren Byrne: it is his other daughter, he actually has five daughters.
@Darius Guppy: I would be really surprised if she was selected to run in the next GE. Her political career is done.
@CrabaRev: she’s already selected, is she not? They need to de-select her.
@Darius Guppy: needs 5 swings so!!
@James Wallace: Perhaps. I don’t know. I cannot see her being allowed to run for Fine Gael again.
Not sure she’d get many votes even if she did.
@Olive Whyte: well she did manage to show Leo up for the coward he really is , If she is so innocent give the hotel the OK to release the CCTV and let us all see just how negligent the Hotel was ….
@Daithi Ó Raghallaigh: All in good time.. When the time is right..
its the dock she should be standing -not elections !
@Eric Davies: its the dock she should be standing in -not an election !
About time one of the party broke ranks on this.
@James Wallace: what are you on about
@Den Henry:
You’re hardly having trouble interpreting that now, are ya?
@Den Henry: it’s not rocket science, then again maybe it is to you, everything seems to go over your head. So I’ll explain in simple words what I mean.
When it first broke about her dodgy claim, FG tds stayed quiet and said nothing. Last week, Leo released a statement in an attempt to whitewash. With me so far, Den?
The Leo statement was, as I’ve said, an attempt to whitewash this and bury it. ‘Move on, nothing to see here’ was the message. Again, FG TDs stayed quiet and said nothing. Until now, when one of them has finally broken rank and criticised her and indirectly, his party leader.
Got it, now?
@James Wallace: are you a blue shirt
@Den Henry: like I said, everything seems to go over your head.
Let the voters of Dun Laoghaire decide her fate as a T D. After all it was they who elected get in the first place. My feeling is that they will reject her as an honest, trustworthy representative, when the time comes and at the same time teach Fine Gael a lesson that they don’t seem to understand the outrage that she has caused.
Lets not forget our good friend in Malahide, Mr. Alan Farrell TD Fine Gael for attempting to defraud Hertz out of €15,000 for person injuries for a minor dent to his Audi A6, Invoice damages estimate €882, which he subsequently withdrew. The judge on the day reduced the damages to €2,500 and he was delighted to stick this in his back pocket. Subsequently, on RTE Prime Time he was confronted about these allegations and refused to comment. He was seen up an ESB pool a few weeks later posing for a photograph for election. He was also heavily involved in a rugby game, despite his assertion that he would have been out of commission for 18 months.
Its imperative that the electorate remove this legislator and compo cheat from his position in the next general election. ( no affiliation with any political party ).
@Patrick Wall: +1
A politician milking the system? Never. You know they spent 233k on bar booze in ten months which we footed?
@Cat K.: and that’s subsidised too, you know because they can’t afford to pay the prices they decide the rest of us should pay.
As much as i detest FG, i say let her run and let FG lose a seat, as opposed to letting another FG candidate win a seat.
She should actually run. Leo said this is acceptable for FG, so let’s see what the public think. She’ll probably get elected in dun laoighaire, but it would impact everyone else’s votes.
@Renton Burke: I don’t think she’d get elected in Dun Laoghaire, but agree she should run.
AM I correct in this? Maria Bailey’s took her chances and she’s now on a losing streak. Leo has only taken a cushy role from her. He’s supported Josepha Madigan as having nothing to do with the case while Madigan’s legal firm stood to get paid 11500 euro for acting on behalf of Bailey.
It seems the hubris has not been washed from Leinster House. Children’s hospital budget is a shambles, as is health and housing. Government is in debt forever and they want to put €3bn into rural broadband.
The pension I’ve been paying into for 30 years may not be given to me if I’m means tested and considered to be ineligible. While some previous government ministers draw several pensions.
All this while they plan to vandalise the city by cutting down thousands of trees to make room for more buses. God help any FG rep that comes to my door during an election campaign. Maria Bailey just lit the match that has shone a light on how inept and self entitled these people are.
neither should joseph a madigan or alan farrell
What about Alan Farrell, why is he being excused ?.
She sat on a swing without holding on and fell. Most of us would have left it at that. But she decided that it wasn’t her fault and sued. These are the only important facts in this. Everyone knows this, and I therefore hope that people remember this come the next election if she is still on the ticket.
Brass neck asking for 20,000 up front. Tony Soprano wouldn’t do that….
This one should be expelled from FG.
Agree with Fergus–she has now become a liability
Maria Bailey? Ah yes, a pillock of society
Hardly short of a few Bob and she behaved like a scobie. Gluttony, plain and simple and there is another td that should be ashamed of the “advice” she gave. Disgusting bunch of parasites. Leo with his lovely socks too soft and well.
Of course she should stand – representing as she does the values of many of our politicians, legal profession and general members of our society.
Whether anyone should vote for her is entirely a different matter.
She’ll sue him for saying that…
I think she should resign along with varadeker, Harris, Murphy, Paschal, Hogan, Regina, Shit I can’t think of all of their names but I,m sure you get my jist.
Alan Farrell should not be permitted to stand either. Another FG insurance fraudster.
Ah here now. She has been vilified on social media? What more punishment do you want? Someone even made an edited clip with her repeating Sean Orourke’s name. It made her sound very silly and is very unfair treatment for a loyal party member.
@thephantomshit: yes she has been vilified enough. She made a mistake. She wasn’t advised very well. She was dishonest and for a person in the public eye and in government she can’t be seen to be seen to get away with it. She should step down and get on with her life.
@thephantomshit: Are u for real – public rep filled out an disingenuous affidavit and we expected to feel sorry for her. She brought all this negative publicity upon herself.
If the shoe was on the other foot she would be quick to point the finger at others less Fortunate than herself
@Caoimhín O’Cheallacháin: She committed a crime, not just a mistake. A crime that runs parallel to a serious issue facing taxpayers today and a serious issue that the government is supposed to be addressing on our behalf, that’s their job. Also she has never been short of a few bob so committing fraud to the tune of tens of thousands is just greed and corruption. Get her out of public office, she doesn’t belong there and she is free to make a living in the private sector if they will have her. Her father also has form in this regard, he is also a public servant and as mentioned above only ran in the last local elections so that they could nab the seat via a co-opt. She and her ilk represent everything that is wrong with Irish politics, good riddance to bad rubbish and hopefully that opens the door to getting rid of many more of them.
@Martin Brennan: A swing and a miss. For clarity I do not like Maria Bailey.
These people are supposed to be beyond reproach and lead by example,
And yeh when they are caught out the spin machine kicks in,
Personally she or Fine Gael won’t be getting my vote if she stands.
All politicians are liar’s just making a scapegoat out of her because they think there’s going to be a election
@Margaret Kane: remember leo telling the nation “when people commit insurance fraud -they put THEIR hands in YOUR pockets ” ? so she is not just a lier- but also a fraudster ! – you try diddling the insurance companies and see if you get to stay out of mountjoy !
@Eric Davies: Put Alan Farrel in your statement as well.
@Eric Davies: we also know Leo is a liar and insurance companies were robbing people before this happened
She SHOULD stand for election, and her constituents should decide whether or not she retains her seat.
To make a decent party out of Fine Gael you need to get rid of a lot more then two
Shur we all know where fine gael priorities lie don’t we…
jokes with sworn testimony can end badly…..
Should have said “elected her”
I think Maria lost the run of herself and probably had influences in her life that she should have ignored..I say forgive her and hopefully she will learn because we all make mistakes in life.
@Marty from Sligo: yeah, someone put a gun to her head to ask for that 20grand.
@Marty from Sligo: ‘lost the run of herself’? apparently, this was done on the advice of madigan. neither of them had lost the run of themselves. they just wanted to create an opportunity for self enrichment at our expense. remember that teh law firm would also benefit financially from this, not just bailey herself
@Marty from Sligo: She hasn’t actually apologised and admitted she made a mistake though, has she? Still playing the victim last I heard, dropped the case due to public pressure and investigations.
@Marty from Sligo: Jesus would be proud of you. As for learning from her mistake… next time she sits on a swing she will put her drinks down , and she will say look what happened the last time.
It’s very obvious she should not stand.
The question shouldn’t even arise.
Im no fan of FG and it SEEMS FG are using this to defect from very ongoing serious issues and ongoing scandals affecting society&I do think that’s unfair to Maria.They did so after local elections when they just regained 20 seats out of the 100 seats they lost in 2014 local elections!
She made errors of judgement(& not the 1st politician to do that& definitely not excusing that) and these would have been discussed in a court setting ,and judgement /consequences made accordingly.It feels uncomfortable to witness FG being judge and jury in this case instead.Also have other politicians been asked not to run in elections?
As Pierce Doherty uncovered, there’s very little fraud re insurance cases therefore not the cause of insurance costs increases.
@Nuala Mc Namara: stop talking absolute rubbish, you sound like a member of FG when you spout that nonsense “a serious error in judgement” she lied, a down right lie, it wasn’t an error,, it was a thought out process on her behalf, she said she received advice,, but she was still the one who chose to take it, and it was all just to add more money to her bank balance, but she got caught, then in the way that only the most self entitled arrogant people can, went and blamed everyone else involved bar herself, she and others just like her are the reason that ordinary hard working people hate politics and politicians, and when they see her receiving a slap on the wrist and nothing else happening I hope they make other FG candidates pay for it in when they run in future elections.
@Devilsavocado: Can you not see that if case had proceeded to court there could have been real financial etc repercussions if judge thought case was exaggerated? However she halted the case once it became public &FG became judge and jury resulting in just ‘slap on the wrist’(&really denying her opportunity to have her case assessed by a court& judge)….which is exactly the point I’m trying to make!
Also the spin machine keeping this story in the spotlight which is deflecting from even more serious issues,eg yesterday more RTE revelations re cervical screening scandal but most of the media didn’t even mention it(disgusted by that!)…..instead focusing on Maria Bailey!
We have National emergencies in homelessness, housing and health( as well as other scandals) which should be the main focus for voters& we shouldn’t be desensitizes by the spin machine deflection!
I’m not a FG supporter & I won’t be deflected!You should read Gene Kerrigan’s article in Sunday Indo!
@Nuala Mc Namara: By the way ‘errors of judgement’ means poor decisions…..do you disagree!?
I absolutely don’t agree with FG policies but I feel very uncomfortable with the ongoing vilification of Maria Bailey& i feel very uncomfortable with it deflecting from extremely serious issues affecting society especially women and children.
@Nuala Mc Namara: Speaking re deflection….. where will June’s official homeless figures be released…..late again!
A bit mean kicking her when she is down….
@iComment: What now or after she “fell” from the swing?
She shouldn’t stand she hurt her back on the swing remember
I’ll translate the politician-speak: I’m worried about a voter backlash ( resulting from the Maria Bailey controversy ) that could either cost me my Dail seat, or make it harder to get re-elected, in the forthcoming general election. If she doesn’t run for election then this threat to my re-election can be reduced, since the issue will have drifted away from public awareness.
Taking the case was certainly Bailey’s Ratner moment her political career is finished as soon as there is a general election
U
I’ve no affiliation to Miss Bailey nore would I vote for any one in FG, but i have to say they are such a dis.gusting party her father gave his life to building and maintaining support in South Dublin. They have no loyalty at all to the people who work for them
1) What was the Hotel doing having a swing inside – feed up the punters with drink then let them off on a swing – mad idea 2) Entitled to take a case if you are hurt because of someone else’s negligence 3) Solicitor takes instructions – hard to know if a client is lying – if a solicitor becomes aware of fraud must withdraw from case 4) Maria Bailey lied on affidavit and that is totally unacceptable and she should be thrown out of seat and party 5) See in comments that a male FG TD may have been in a somewhat similar situation. If it is a woman then the witch hunting mob really go for it in a way you don’t see happening to a man 6) Can’t stand these inherited seat situations – not a kingdom.
Why shouldn’t she represent fine gael b in the next election? Isn’t she showing her constituents how to get on in fine gael Ireland? Does the government have several departmentsof fraud administration?
Get rid of her. She’s another example of Fianna gael politician. A lying thief …
Weak Leo. Another step towards a FF GOV.
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