BILL GATES
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BILL GATES
A Biography
Michael B. Becraft
GREENWOOD BIOGRAPHIES
Copyright 2014 by ABC-CLIO, LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Becraft, Michael B.
Bill Gates : a biography / Michael B. Becraft.
pages cm — (Greenwood biographies)
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-4408-3013-6 (hardback) — ISBN 978-1-4408-3014-3 (ebook) 1. Gates, Bill, 1955– 2. Microsoft Corporation—History. 3. Businessmen—United States—Biography. I. Title.
HD9696.2.U62G3724 2014
338.7′61004092—dc23
[B] 2014017770
ISBN: 978-1-4408-3013-6
EISBN: 978-1-4408-3014-3
18 17 16 15 14 1 2 3 4 5
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CONTENTS
Series Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgments
Timeline: Events in the Life of Bill Gates
Chapter 1 Bill Gates before Automated Computing
Chapter 2 Early Days in Computing
Chapter 3 Early Days of Microsoft
Chapter 4 Development of Products Used Today (1985–1998)
Chapter 5 Why Was Microsoft So Successful with Bill Gates?
Chapter 6 Microsoft Trial
Chapter 7 Steve Jobs and Bill Gates
Chapter 8 Bill Gates in Writings
Chapter 9 Family and Home of Bill
Chapter 10 Role in Corporate Governance, Activism, and Outside Interests of Bill Gates
Chapter 11 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Giving Pledge
Conclusion
Notes
Further Reading
Index
SERIES FOREWORD
In response to school and library needs, ABC-CLIO publishes this distinguished series of full-length biographies specifically for student use. Prepared by field experts and professionals, these engaging biographies are tailored for students who need challenging yet accessible biographies. Ideal for school assignments and student research, the length, format, and subject areas are designed to meet educators’ requirements and students’ interests.
ABC-CLIO offers an extensive selection of biographies spanning all curriculum-related subject areas, including social studies, the sciences, literature and the arts, history and politics, and popular culture, covering public figures and famous personalities from all time periods and backgrounds, both historic and contemporary, who have made an impact on American and/or world culture. The subjects of these biographies were chosen based on comprehensive feedback from librarians and educators. Consideration was given to both curriculum relevance and inherent interest. Readers will find a wide array of subject choices from fascinating entertainers like Miley Cyrus and Lady Gaga to inspiring leaders like John F. Kennedy and Nelson Mandela, from the greatest athletes of our time like Michael Jordan and Muhammad Ali to the most amazing success stories of our day like J. K. Rowling and Oprah.
While the emphasis is on fact, not glorification, the books are meant to be fun to read. Each volume provides in-depth information about the subject’s life from birth through childhood, the teen years, and adulthood. A thorough account relates family background and education; traces personal and professional influences; and explores struggles, accomplishments, and contributions. A timeline highlights the most significant life events against an historical perspective. Bibliographies supplement the reference value of each volume.
PREFACE
In fewer than three decades, Bill Gates led Microsoft from a start-up in the era of no home computers to almost ubiquitous computing, becoming the world’s richest person and using the accumulated wealth to improve the global good.
At the leading edge of the movement toward personal computing, Mr. Gates dropped out of Harvard to become co-founder of Microsoft. Over a period of three decades at Microsoft, Mr. Gates became the world’s richest person while serving as a senior executive, technology visionary, and public face of the firm until July 2008, and non-executive chairman from that point until February 2014. Mr. Gates’s efforts are now directed toward the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the world’s largest charitable foundation. This philanthropic effort is similar to the Andrew Carnegie and Cornelius Vanderbilt charitable focus, using the wealth built over each individual’s lifetime.
This book is not intended to be a history of Microsoft nor a history of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, but a concise biography of Bill Gates. His story is inextricably linked to these two organizations, and those organizations will continue to be shaped by him for years to come.
The story of Bill Gates is exceptionally complicated, but the book was written with six major objectives. The first is to illustrate the evolution of Bill Gates from budding entrepreneur to computer programmer to billionaire to philanthropist. Most readers have perceptions of the subject as a billionaire and philanthropist. Second, the book demonstrates that Gates’s success was based on a profound understanding of the potential of technology. Third, the book attempts to capture the stages of evolution within Microsoft from inception until the point Mr. Gates left day-to-day control of the company, as this helps us understand how computers moved from objects owned by only the largest of businesses to a nearly ubiquitous item. Fourth, the book takes an approach that recognizes accomplishments as well as failures, praise as well as criticism. In fact, Gates has faced four decades of criticism in some form, despite possessing what many would perceive as traditional measures of success (family, work, accomplishment, and civic engagement). Fifth, the book addresses the motivation of Mr. Gates to use his vast financial wealth to improve the health and education of the poor around the world. Finally, the book attempts to expose the reader to concepts related to the business applications inherent in Mr. Gates’s work in global organizations, in nontechnical language and tone.
Along the way, we discover that Bill Gates was—and continues to be—exceptional with po
sitive traits as well as flaws. He was exceptionally fortunate to have been born at the right time to get computer experience and understand at a young age where the industry could go; when he cofounded Microsoft, he was 19. He understood when to take risks and saw many trends in the marketplace, although he also missed many trends along the way. We also see an individual who was competitive, yet always stating that his reason for this competitiveness was the risk of failure; success was never assured in his mind. Gates saw the need for software companies to have firm intellectual property rights and copyrights in the first year of Microsoft’s existence and was exceptionally challenging to work for, but also recognized when others provided the most valuable insight. He firmly believed that the products being developed could readily be overtaken by competitors, that he would never have been able to retire from Microsoft if he waited until no competitors would remain, and that work to improve the lives of others with his amassed wealth could be just as rewarding as being the CEO of Microsoft.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Any major activity or undertaking requires the confidence and beliefs of others. I have been exceptionally fortunate throughout my education—formal and informal—to have encountered individuals who have permitted me to gather experiences and skills that many in the United States, and the vast majority worldwide, could not imagine. Out of a persistent fear of omitting someone of critical importance on a list of acknowledgments, I prefer to say “thank you” as I meet each.
I also hope readers know that each of us can be involved in bettering the lives of others in our communities and worldwide with fewer financial resources than Mr. Gates; in the 2014 annual letter released by Bill and Melinda Gates on behalf of their foundation, he states, “If you’re looking to donate a few dollars, you should know that organizations working in health and development offer a phenomenal return on your money.”
If you are interested in service that greatly improves the lives of others—such as the initiatives of Bill, Melinda, and Bill Sr.—there are dozens of options to commit to helping others. Bill Sr. and I share a common connection as Rotarians involved in the aim to end polio, and Rotary International has participation options for all ages.
TIMELINE: EVENTS IN THE LIFE OF BILL GATES
1955 William Henry Gates III is born on October 28, to William Henry Gates II and Mary Maxwell Gates. As the younger Gates later becomes famous as “Bill Gates,” his father eventually adopts the name “Bill Gates Sr.”
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.
1974 Paul Allen sees the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics, which features the Altair 8800.
1975 Gates and Allen move to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to found Micro-Soft, initially writing the BASIC programming language for the Altair 8800; Gates stops attending Harvard to lead the new firm at the age of 19.
1976 Gates writes the Open Letter to Hobbyists, his first attempt at protecting the intellectual property of Microsoft.
1977 Microsoft officially becomes a partnership between Gates and Allen, with Gates owning 64 percent of the company.
1978 Microsoft wins arbitration hearing against the maker of the Altair 8800, allowing the company to sell BASIC to many different computer manufacturers.
1979 Microsoft moves to Gates’s and Allen’s home state of Washington (initially Bellevue, a suburb of Seattle).
1980 In another attempt to protect intellectual property, Gates states that “no one is getting rich” writing software in an interview. Gates hires Steve Ballmer—the person who would eventually become the second CEO—to Microsoft.
1981 The first version of MS-DOS is the operating system for the new IBM PC; the core of the software was bought from another company.
1983 Allen leaves Microsoft after overhearing a conversation between Gates and Ballmer. Gates and Ballmer write the Applications Strategy Memo, committing Microsoft to writing for the Apple Macintosh as well as for the PC.
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.
1987 Bill Gates meets Melinda French, whom he would later marry.
1988 Apple sues Microsoft for using the graphical user interface each company had learned about from Xerox PARC.
1989 Bill Gates founds the company now known as Corbis, a venture outside of Microsoft he still fully owns.
1990 Windows 3.0 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 (rather than a university or museum).
1995 Bill Gates writes The Internet Tidal Wave memo, declaring that the Internet is the most important concept since the IBM PC was released in 1981. Microsoft agrees to a consent decree with the U.S. Department of Justice related to anticompetitive behavior. Windows 95 comes out later that year with Internet Explorer 1.0. Gates releases the first edition of his co-authored best seller, The Road Ahead.
1996 Gates releases the second edition of his co-authored best seller, The Road Ahead. He and Melinda welcome first child Jennifer Katharine, and he starts his first major philanthropic project.
1997 Bill Gates and Steve Jobs announce an investment by Microsoft in a struggling Apple. The U.S. Department of Justice files a contempt motion against Microsoft from the 1995 consent decree.
1998 While entering a building in Belgium, Gates is hit in the face with four pies. Ralph Nader suggests that Bill Gates and Warren Buffett should convene a conference of billionaires for philanthropic purposes. The antitrust trial against Microsoft begins, with Bill Gates’s deposition a critical component of the government’s case.
1999 Gates releases his second co-authored best seller, Business @ the Speed of Thought. U.S. District Court judge Thomas Penfield Jackson declares Microsoft to be a monopoly. He and Melinda welcome second child Rory John.
2000 Ballmer becomes CEO of Microsoft, while Gates remains chairman and chief software architect. As the legal remedy in the Microsoft trial, Judge Jackson orders a break-up of the firm.
2001 In an appeal by Microsoft, comments made by Judge Jackson against the firm and Gates become public, leading the judge to leave the case.
2002 U.S. District Court judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly places Microsoft under a new consent decree, without ordering the break-up of the company. Bill and Melinda welcome third child Phoebe Adele.
2004 Gates is elected to the Board of Directors of Berkshire Hathaway, the investment company run by his friend Warren Buffett.
2007 Gates gives the Commencement Address at Harvard University.
2008 Gates has his last day as a full-time employee of Microsoft to focus on the work of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as his primary responsibility.
2010 The Giving Pledge—a group of billionaires who dedicate at least half of their wealth to philanthropic purposes—is initiated by the two people recommended by Ralph Nader, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett.
2011 Immediately after the death of Steve Jobs, the public learns much about the relationship between Gates and Jobs over the past three decades.
2014 Gates resigns from the role of chairman of the board at Microsoft but announces that he will be spending more time at the firm, mentoring the newly appointed third CEO of Microsoft (Ballmer’s successor, Satya Nadella) in the role of technology advisor.
Chapter 1
BILL GATES BEFORE AUTOMATED COMPUTING
Well, I was lucky in many ways. I was lucky to be born with certain skills. I was lucky to have parents th
at created an environment where they shared what they were working on and let me buy as many books as I wanted to. And I was lucky in terms of the timing. The invention of the microprocessor was something profound. And it turned out only if you were kind of young and looking at that could you appreciate what it meant. And then I had been obsessed with writing software. It turned out that was the key missing thing that would allow the microprocessor to have this incredible impact…. It is unusual to have so much luck in one life, I think. But it’s been a major factor in what I have been able to do.1
Upon his birth on October 28, 1955, to a successful family, William Henry Gates III—now widely known as Bill Gates—could easily have been expected to follow in the paths of either of his parents. His father, William Henry Gates II (1925–present), and mother, Mary Maxwell Gates (1929–1994), each were professionals with advanced formal educations. His father was an attorney with a successful practice, which allowed his mother to transition from work as a schoolteacher into other activities with civic and charity impacts.
As relayed by his father, Bill Gates’s maternal grandmother and great-grandmother quickly found that a nickname would be required for the younger Gates. A concern was raised that both father and son would be referred to as Bill, which would be overly confusing. As a result, the younger of the two was nicknamed Trey2 (as in “three” or “third”), and this nickname is still used when father refers to the son. As his son became far better known globally as “Bill Gates” instead of Trey, his father later adopted the name “Bill Gates, Sr.,” retiring from his law firm Preston Gates & Ellis in 1998.3
Gates’s mother was a 1950 graduate of the University of Washington, where she would later serve on the Board of Regents from 1975 to 1993. Originally a schoolteacher, Mary Gates maintained an exceptional level of civic involvement after her husband’s law practice became successful. Mary was clearly connected to the University of Washington. Not only did she meet her husband there, but her parents both graduated from the University of Washington. Per a dedication ceremony at the University of Washington after her death, she also served on multiple boards for the university, including the University of Washington Foundation Board, the University of Washington Medical Center Board, and the School of Business Administration’s Advisory Board.
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