tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-191919653423679362024-02-06T19:15:27.744-08:00Bill GatesBill Gateshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02442523868291424105noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19191965342367936.post-39302472889565959392010-12-09T00:10:00.000-08:002010-12-09T00:25:11.906-08:00Windows-<div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: x-large;">M</span>icrosoft launched its first retail version of<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>Microsoft Windows<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>on November 20, 1985, and in August, the company struck a deal with<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>IBM<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>to develop a separate operating system called<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>OS/2. Although the two companies successfully developed the first version of the new system, mounting creative differences undermined the partnership. Gates distributed an internal memo on May 16, 1991, announcing that the OS/2 partnership was over and Microsoft would shift its efforts to the<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>Windows NT kernel<span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: black;"> </span>development.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><h3 style="line-height: 14.25pt; margin-bottom: .05in; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;"><span class="mw-headline"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></span></span></h3><h3 style="line-height: 14.25pt; margin-bottom: .05in; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="mw-headline"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;">Management style-</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></h3><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>From Microsoft's founding in 1975 until 2006, Gates had primary responsibility for the company's product strategy. He aggressively broadened the company's range of products, and wherever Microsoft achieved a dominant position he vigorously defended it.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>As an executive, Gates met regularly with Microsoft's senior managers and program managers. Firsthand accounts of these meetings describe him as verbally combative, berating managers for perceived holes in their business strategies or proposals that placed the company's long-term interests at risk.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>He often interrupted presentations with such comments as, "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard!"<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and, "Why don't you just give up your<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>options<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and join the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Peace Corps?"<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The target of his outburst then had to defend the proposal in detail until, hopefully, Gates was fully convinced.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>When subordinates appeared to be procrastinating, he was known to remark sarcastically, "I'll do it over the weekend."<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>Gates's role at Microsoft for most of its history was primarily a management and executive role. However, he was an active software developer in the early years, particularly on the company's<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>programming language<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>products. He has not officially been on a development team since working on the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>TRS-80 Model 100 line, but wrote code as late as 1989 that shipped in the company's products.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>On June 15, 2006, Gates announced that he would transition out of his day-to-day role over the next two years to dedicate more time to philanthropy. He divided his responsibilities between two successors, placing<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Ray Ozzie<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>in charge of day-to-day management and<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Craig Mundie<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>in charge of long-term product strategy.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>Philanthropy-<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>Gates began to realize the expectations others had of him when public opinion mounted that he could give more of his wealth to charity. Gates studied the work of<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Andrew Carnegie<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>John D. Rockefeller<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and in 1994 sold some of his Microsoft stock to create the William H. Gates Foundation. In 2000, Gates and his wife combined three family foundations into one to create the charitable<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which is the largest transparently operated charitable foundation in the world.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The foundation is set up to allow benefactors access to how its money is being spent, unlike other major charitable organizations such as the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Wellcome Trust.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The generosity and extensive philanthropy of<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>David Rockefeller<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>has been credited as a major influence. Gates and his father have met with Rockefeller several times and have modeled their giving in part on the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Rockefeller family's philanthropic focus, namely those global problems that are ignored by governments and other organizations.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>As of 2007, Bill and Melinda Gates were the second most generous philanthropists in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">America</st1:place></st1:country-region>, having given over $28 billion to charity.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>The foundation has also received criticism because it invests the assets that it has not yet distributed with the exclusive goal of maximizing the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>return on investment. As a result, its investments include companies that have been criticized for worsening poverty in the same developing countries where the Foundation is attempting to relieve poverty. These include companies that pollute heavily and pharmaceutical companies that do not sell into the developing world.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>In response to press criticism, the foundation announced in 2007 a review of its investments to assess social responsibility It subsequently cancelled the review and stood by its policy of investing for maximum return, while using voting rights to influence company practices.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Gates has made<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The Giving Pledge<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>to donate over half of his wealth to charity.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><br />
</div>Bill Gateshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02442523868291424105noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19191965342367936.post-38852584996061047522010-12-09T00:09:00.001-08:002010-12-09T00:26:41.803-08:00Microsoft-<div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgK968sJBxbhAQhV4zWk910yua4johNBjzQNpNUnKoOlQP4H3lDC3MZbeagPDh_ZjBoldNvckO42o1lXzCiF55mHhZUB379TngERa32TjOlvgXztAh1Olh_i1xzIWS_nFPqEPkKGOUcEw/s1600/post+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="442" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgK968sJBxbhAQhV4zWk910yua4johNBjzQNpNUnKoOlQP4H3lDC3MZbeagPDh_ZjBoldNvckO42o1lXzCiF55mHhZUB379TngERa32TjOlvgXztAh1Olh_i1xzIWS_nFPqEPkKGOUcEw/s640/post+1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: red; font-size: x-large;">B</span>ASIC - <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;">After reading the January 1975 issue of<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Popular Electronics<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>that demonstrated the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Altair 8800, Gates contacted<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>(MITS), the creators of the new microcomputer, to inform them that he and others were working on a<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>BASIC<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>interpreter for the platform.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>In reality, Gates and Allen did not have an Altair and had not written code for it; they merely wanted to gauge MITS's interest. MITS president<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Ed Roberts<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>agreed to meet them for a demo, and over the course of a few weeks they developed an Altair<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>emulator<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>that ran on a minicomputer, and then the BASIC interpreter. The demonstration, held at MITS's offices in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Albuquerque</st1:place></st1:city>, was a success and resulted in a deal with MITS to distribute the interpreter as<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Altair BASIC. Paul Allen was hired into MITS,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and Gates took a leave of absence from Harvard to work with Allen at MITS in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Albuquerque</st1:place></st1:city> in November 1975. They named their partnership "Micro-Soft" and had their first office located in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Albuquerque</st1:city></st1:place>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Within a year, the hyphen was dropped, and on November 26, 1976, the trade name "Microsoft" was registered with the Office of the Secretary of the State of <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New Mexico</st1:place></st1:state>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Gates never returned to Harvard to complete his studies.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>Microsoft's BASIC was popular with computer hobbyists, but Gates discovered that a pre-market copy had leaked into the community and was being widely copied and distributed. In February 1976, Gates wrote an<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Open Letter to Hobbyists<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>in the MITS newsletter saying that MITS could not continue to produce, distribute, and maintain high-quality software without payment.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>This letter was unpopular with many computer hobbyists, but Gates persisted in his belief that software developers should be able to demand payment. Microsoft became independent of MITS in late 1976, and it continued to develop programming language software for various systems.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The company moved from <st1:city w:st="on">Albuquerque</st1:city> to its new home in<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Bellevue</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">Washington</st1:state></st1:place><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>on January 1, 1979.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>During Microsoft's early years, all employees had broad responsibility for the company's business. Gates oversaw the business details, but continued to write code as well. In the first five years, he personally reviewed every line of code the company shipped, and often rewrote parts of it as he saw fit.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><br />
</div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>IBM Parnership-<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;"><b>In 1980,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>IBM<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>approached Microsoft to write the BASIC interpreter for its upcoming personal computer, the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>IBM PC. When IBM's representatives mentioned that they needed an operating system, Gates referred them to<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Digital Research<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>(DRI), makers of the widely used CP/M<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>operating system.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>IBM's discussions with Digital Research went poorly, and they did not reach a licensing agreement. IBM representative Jack Sams mentioned the licensing difficulties during a subsequent meeting with Gates and told him to get an acceptable operating system. A few weeks later Gates proposed using<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>86-DOS<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>(QDOS), an operating system similar to CP/M that<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Tim Paterson<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>ofSeattle Computer Products<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>(SCP) had made for hardware similar to the PC. Microsoft made a deal with SCP to become the exclusive licensing agent, and later the full owner, of 86-DOS. After adapting the operating system for the PC, Microsoft delivered it to IBM as<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>PC-DOS in exchange for a one-time fee of $50,000. Gates did not offer to transfer the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>copyright<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>on the operating system, because he believed that other hardware vendors would clone IBM's system.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>They did, and the sales of<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>MS-DOS<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>made Microsoft a major player in the industry.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div><div style="line-height: 18.0pt; margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 4.8pt;"><b>Gates oversaw Microsoft's company restructuring on June 25, 1981, which re-incorporated the company in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:state w:st="on">Washington</st1:state></st1:place> state and made Gates President of Microsoft and the Chairman of the Board.</b></div>Bill Gateshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02442523868291424105noreply@blogger.com0