A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person’s life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person’s experience of these life events. Bill Gates: A Biography is a book by Becraft Michael. Bill Gates has been instrumental in creating and developing the home computing era that has thoroughly transformed nearly every aspect of our lives, from work to commerce to communication. Stepping down as CEO of Microsoft in 2000 after 25 years at the helm, he remained as chairman, a position he still holds.
Compellingly written and wonderfully structured this Bill Gates shares Bill Gates: A Biography, capturing his first encounter with the then still infantile world of computer science and charting the growth of Microsoft from its humble beginning as an unknown company of 25 employees to one of the world’s most powerful corporations. The biography of Bill Gates explores his focus on further improving a world already bettered by his unprecedented contribution to the world of technology.
Family and early childhood:
Table of Contents
William Henry Gates the III is also referred to as “The king of Software” he co-founded the Microsoft Corporation, the largest computer software company. On October 28, 1955, shortly after 9:00 p.m., William Henry Gates III was born. He was the middle child of William H. Gates II, a prominent Seattle lawyer, and Mary Gates, who worked as a teacher before she had kids. Bill had an older sister, Kristi, and a younger sister, Libby. He was born into a family with a rich history in business, politics, and community service. His great-grandfather had been a state legislator and mayor, his grandfather was the vice president of a national bank, and his father was a prominent lawyer.
Early on in life, it was apparent that Bill Gates inherited the ambition, intelligence, and competitive spirit that had helped his progenitors rise to the top in their chosen professions. In elementary school, he quickly surpassed all his peer’s abilities in nearly all subjects, especially math and science. His parents recognized his intelligence and decided to enroll him in Lakeside, a private school known for its intense academic environment. This decision had far-reaching effects on Bill Gates: A Biography. At Lakeside, Bill Gates was first introduced to computers.
Early Education:
When Bill turned thirteen his parents sent him to the Lakeside Preparatory School hoping it would prove more of a challenge for him. It was at Lakeside where Bill met his future business partner Paul Allen. He also was introduced to computers at Lakeside.
First Computing Experience:
In the fall of 1968, Computer Centre Corporation opened for business in Seattle. It was offering computing time at good rates, and one of the chief programmers working for the corporation had a child attending Lakeside. School and the Computer Centre Corporation that allowed the school to continue providing its students with computer time.
They even altered the files that recorded the amount of computer time they were using. Computer Centre Corporation banned them from the system for several weeks. They were determined to find a way to apply their computer skills in the real world. The first opportunity to do this was a direct result of their mischievous activity with the school’s computer time. Although the group was hired just to find bugs, they also read any computer-related material that the day shift had left behind.
Business History:
In 1975, Gates dropped out of Harvard to start a software company with Paul Allen called Microsoft. The company was doing well, but it was in 1980 that Gates made a deal with IBM that would change computing. Microsoft reached a deal to provide the MS-DOS operating system on the new IBM PC. Gates sold the software to IBM for a fee of $50,000, however, he held onto the copyright of the software. When the PC market took off, Microsoft also sold MS-DOS to other PC manufacturers. Soon, Microsoft was the operating system in a large percentage of computers around the world.
Needs & Target Market:
In 1985, Gates and Microsoft took another risk. They released the Microsoft Windows operating system. This was Microsoft’s answer to a similar operating system introduced by Apple in 1984. At first, many people complained that Microsoft Windows wasn’t as good as the Apple version. However, Gates continued to press the open PC concept. Microsoft Windows could run on a variety of PC-compatible machines, while the Apple operating system only ran on Apple machines. Microsoft won the operating system battle and was soon installed on nearly 90% of the world’s personal computers.
Some facts:
Like most successful entrepreneurs, Bill Gates’ success came from a combination of hard work, intelligence, timing, business sense, and luck. Gates constantly challenged his employees to work harder and innovate, but he also worked as hard or harder than the people who worked for him. Gates also wasn’t afraid to take risks. He took a risk when he dropped out of Harvard to start his own company. He also took a risk when he changed Microsoft’s operating system from MS-DOS to Windows. However, his risks were calculated. He had confidence in himself and his product. Gates married Melinda French in January of 1994.
They have since had three children including two daughters and a son. In 2000, Gates and his wife formed the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Today, this is one of the largest charitable foundations in the world. Gates personally has donated over $28 billion to charity.
Some Events in the life of Gates:
1968: Bill Gates has his first experience with a computer of the time at his private high school.
1972: The first software partnership of Gates and Paul Allen, along with friend Paul Gilbert, is the Traf-O-Data machine.
1977: Microsoft officially becomes a partnership between Gates and Allen, with Gates owning 64 percent of the company.
1979: Microsoft moves to Gates’s and Allen’s home state of Washington.
1985: Gates is ranked as one of the 50 Most Eligible Bachelors. Microsoft signs an agreement with IBM to write the OS/2 operating system and releases the first version of Windows.
1986 Microsoft becomes a publicly traded company, and Bill Gates’s holdings make him quantifiably rich.
1990 Windows 3 is released and becomes an immediate success.
1994 Bill Gates marries Melinda French; his mother passes away later in the year. He also purchases the Codex Leicester, the only notebook from Leonardo da Vinci that is owned by an individual.