THE BIOGRAPHY OF

BILL GATES
 BACKGROUND OF BILL GATES

• William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate, investor, author, philanthropist, and humanitarian. He
is best known as the principal founder of Microsoft Corporation. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions of chairman, CEO
 and chief software architect, while also being the largest individual shareholder until May 2014.
• In 1975, Gates and Paul Allen launched Microsoft, which became the world's largest PC software company. Gates led the company as
chairman and CEO until stepping down as CEO in January 2000, but he remained chairman and became chief software architect. In June
2006, Gates announced that he would be transitioning to a part-time role at Microsoft and full-time work at the 
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the private charitable foundation that he and his wife, Melinda Gates, established in 2000. He gradually
transferred his duties to Ray Ozzie and Craig Mundie. He stepped down as chairman of Microsoft in February 2014 and assumed a new
post as technology adviser to support the newly appointed CEO Satya Nadella.
• Gates is one of the best-known entrepreneurs of the personal computer revolution. He has been criticized for his business tactics, which
have been considered anti-competitive. This opinion has been upheld by numerous court rulings.
• Later in his career and since leaving Microsoft, Gates pursued a number of philanthropic endeavors. He donated large amounts of money to
various charitable organizations and scientific research programs through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, reported to be the world's
largest private charity. In 2009, Gates and Warren Buffett founded The Giving Pledge, whereby they and other billionaires pledge to give at
least half of their wealth to philanthropy. The foundation works to save lives and improve global health, and is working with 
Rotary International to eliminate polio.
 EARLY LIFE
Bill Gates was born William Henry Gates III on October 28, 1955, in Seattle, Washington. Gates grew up in an upper
middle-class family with his older sister, Kristianne, and younger sister, Libby. Their father, William H. Gates Sr., was a
promising, if somewhat shy, law student when he met his future wife, Mary Maxwell. She was an athletic, outgoing student
at the University of Washington, actively involved in student affairs and leadership.

Bill had a very close relationship with his mother, Mary, who after a brief career as a teacher devoted her time to helping
raise the children and working on civic affairs and with charities. She also served on several corporate boards, including
those of the First Interstate Bank in Seattle (founded by her grandfather), the United Way and International Business
Machines (IBM). She would often take Bill along when she volunteered in schools and at community organizations.
 BILL GATES EDUCATION

Bill was a voracious reader as a child, spending many hours poring over reference books such as the encyclopedia. Around the age
of 11 or 12, Bill's parents began to have concerns about his behavior. He was doing well in school, but he seemed bored and
withdrawn at times, and his parents worried he might become a loner.

Though they were strong believers in public education, when Bill turned 13, his parents enrolled him at Seattle's exclusive
preparatory Lakeside School. He blossomed in nearly all his subjects, excelling in math and science, but also doing very well in
drama and English.

While at Lakeside School, a Seattle computer company offered to provide computer time for the students. The Mother's Club used
proceeds from the school's rummage sale to purchase a teletype terminal for students to use. Gates became entranced with what a
computer could do and spent much of his free time working on the terminal. He wrote a tic-tac-toe program in BASIC computer
language that allowed users to play against the computer.

Gates graduated from Lakeside in 1973. He scored 1590 out of 1600 on the college SAT test, a feat of intellectual achievement
that he boasted about for several years when introducing himself to new people.

Gates enrolled at Harvard University in the fall of 1973, originally thinking of a career in law. Much to his parents' dismay, Gates
dropped out of college in 1975 to pursue his business, Microsoft, with partner Allen. 
 BILL GATES FOUNDATION OF MICROSOFT

Bill Gates founded Microsoft in 1976 when he formed a contract with MITS (Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems)
to develop a basic operating system for their new microcomputers. In the early days, Bill Gates would review every line of
code. He was also involved in several aspects of Microsoft’s business such as packing and sending off orders. The big break
for Microsoft came in 1980 when IBM approached them for a new BASIC operating system for its new computers. In the
early 1980s, IBM was by far the leading PC manufacturer. However, increasingly, there developed many IBM PC clones;
(PCs produced by other companies compatible with IBM’s). Microsoft worked hard to sell its operating system to these
other companies. Thus Microsoft was able to gain the dominant position of software manufacture just as the personal
computer market started to boom. Since its early dominance, other companies have struggled to displace Microsoft as the
dominant provider of computer operating software. Programs like Microsoft Word and Excel have become the industry
standard.
 MICROSOFT
In 1990 Microsoft released its first version of Windows. This was a breakthrough in operating software as it
replaced text interfaces with graphical interfaces. It soon became a best seller and was able to capture the
majority of the operating system market share. In 1995 Windows 95 was released, setting new standards and
features for operating systems. This version of Windows has been the backbone of all future releases from
Windows 2000 to the latest XP and Vista.
Throughout his time in office, Bill Gates has been keen to diversify the business of Microsoft. For example,
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer became the dominant web browser, although this was primarily because it came
pre-installed on most new computers. In recent years, Internet Explorer has seen its market share slip.
One area where Microsoft has never been successful is in the area of search engines. MSN live search has
struggled to gain more than 5% of market share. In this respect, Microsoft has been dwarfed by Google.
Nevertheless, the success of Microsoft in cornering various aspects of the software market has led to several
anti-trust cases. In 1998 US v Microsoft, Microsoft came close to being broken up into three smaller firms.
However, on appeal, Microsoft was able to survive as a single firm. Although Microsoft was the dominant
computer firm of the 1980s, and 1990s, they are now seen as an ageing and declining company – compared to
the more dynamic Google and Apple.
THANK YOU