Blog Mr. Bob sieck

William Gates, the son of a prominent Seattle, Washington lawyer, was an underachieving math whiz in school. He was first exposed to digital computers while in the seventh grade and worked on various computer projects for the next several years. While in high school, Gates and a friend, Paul Allen, formed a company called Traf-Data, which used the Intel 8008 microprocessor to help control traffic patterns in Seattle. Gates eventually sold this system to the city for $20,000 when he was only fifteen years old. He dropped out of high school for one year to work for TRW in computing, earning $30,000. In 1974 Gates was attending Harvard University when Allen spotted an advertisement for a $350 assemble-at-home computer called the Altair 8800, manufactured by MITS, a company headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Gates and Allen worked nonstop for six weeks to devise a simple version of BASIC, a programming language, for the Altair. They demonstrated their finished product to the company's engineers with great success, and the following year, Gates and Allen founded Microsoft Corporation. Microsoft had entered the personal computer (PC) industry at an opportune time. The Apple Computer Corporation had introduced its Apple II personal computer with much success. International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) decided to enter the market but needed software designed for specific tasks and an operating system that permitted hardware to interpret the software. In 1980 Microsoft won a contract with IBM to operate personal computers using Microsoft's system, commonly known as MS-DOS. By 1983 the IBM PC had become the industry standard and MS-DOS was its operating system. In 1995, Microsoft introduced Windows 95 which again revolutionized the PC market, and became an industry standard. Today some 90% of all personal computers use Microsoft Windows. In 1991 Gates was ranked number three on the Forbes magazine list of the wealthiest Americans; his share of Microsoft is worth approximately four billion dollars. By 1998 he had become the richest man in the world. In addition to operating systems, Microsoft produces software for word processing, spreadsheets, games, and Windows, which allows IBM PCs and their clones to use pictures and a handheld "mouse" to eliminate complicated keyboard commands, much like Apple did for its computers. In 2001, Microsoft reported fiscal year revenues of $25.3 billion. The company employed more than 40,000 people in 60 countries.

Recent Updates

August 2003: In the wake of the So-Big e-mail worm epidemic, Gates told the Detroit Economic Club that it is time to build better software that will create "trustworthy computing." Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News, August 29, 2003.

September 17, 2003: Gates contributed $51.2 million in grants toward establishing small, academically rigorous public high schools in poor New York neighborhoods.

Source: International Herald Tribune, September 18, 2003, p. 3.

September 2003: Gates topped the Forbes list of the world's richest people for the tenth time in a row, with an estimated worth of $46 billion. Source: Weekend Australian (Sydney, Australia), September 20, 2003, p. 035.

September 2003: Gates donated $168 million to fight malaria, and urged the world to intensify its battle against the disease that kills more than one million people a year. Source: CNN.com, www.cnn.com, September 21, 2003.

October 13, 2003: The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation said that it would double to $200 million its financial commitment to combating HIV and AIDS in India. Source: New York Times, www.nytimes.com, October 16, 2003.

October 2003: Gates gave $25 million to GM research to develop vitamin and protein-enriched seeds for the world's poor, but was criticized by international charities, farmers' groups, and academics in Europe, India and elsewhere, who argued that the money promotes an agriculture that was of little use to the very poor. Source: Guardian (London, England), October 16, 2003, p. 25.

October 2003: Gates and the National Institutes of Health invited scientists to compete for $200 million in research grants aimed at solving problems in global health. Source: Houston Chronicle (Houston, TX), October 19, 2003, p. 1.

January 23, 2004: Gates predicted that e-mail spam would no longer exist in two years. Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News, January 24, 2004.

January 2004: It was announced that Gates would be awarded an honorary knighthood for his "contribution to enterprise" in the United Kingdom. Source: Birmingham Post (England), January 26, 2004, p. 7.

February 2004: It was announced that Gates would donate $82.9 million for research into a new vaccine against tuberculosis. Source: Independent (London, England), February 13, 2004, p. 6.

February 2004: Gates stood as the world's wealthiest person, with a fortune estimated at $60.56 billion. Source: Advertiser(Adelaide, Australia), February 28, 2004, p. 60.

May 4, 2004: Gates reached a deal with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over allegations that he violated anti-trust laws. Gates will pay $800,000 in fines to settle charges that he bought more than ten percent of the voting stock of two different companies without notifying the FTC of the purchases. Source: Financial Times, www.ft.com, May 4, 2004.

August 31, 2004: Gates indicated in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that he is considering pursuing a seat on the board of Six Flags, Inc. Gates has purchased 11.5 percent of the company since 2002 and has criticized the corporation's management. Source: Washington Post, www.washingtonpost.com, September 1, 2004.