BIOGRAPHY OF BILL GATES
William Henry Gates (III) being was born on the 28th of October,1955. He is a
business man, a philanthropist, a pioneer of the microcomputer revolution and the
co-founder of Microsoft alongside his friend Paul Allen, he became the world's
first centi-billionaire, when his net worth surpassed $100 billion. He was named
after his father William Henry Gates (II) who is a lawyer and his mother Mary
Maxwell Gates who was the first woman to sit in the board of directors in the first
interstate bank of Washington. He has two siblings named Kristianne and Libby
gates. Bill gates short for billionaire gates grew up in an upper middle class
family, Bill was a voracious reader, he spent hours reading and wasn't the kind of
person who liked to interact with people, at the age of twelve bill was a loner
which made his parents very worried, so they sent him to a private school where he
could relate with his peers. Bill got enrolled in lakeside school, Seattle. There
he recognized his interest in computers, when a computer company in Seattle provide
computer free time for the students there. Bill maximizing in computer knowledge
wrote his first code at the age of thirteen he wrote a tic-tac-toe program in BASIC
language that allowed users to play games against the computer, there he met Paul
Allen in which they bonded over there common interest of computers and spent a lot
of their free times working over on computer programs. They graduated as good
friends and both got into the Harvard university, where bill studied math 55 as his
major. But he spent most of his time in the computer lab at Harvard writing codes,
bill's parents wanted him to become a lawyer but he insisted on dropping out of
school to maximize his computer career. Bill's parent realizing that his interest
in computer's allowed him to drop out and follow his dreams. Bill dropped out of
school in 1975 to co-found the Microsoft company with his friend Paul Allen, the
name Microsoft was a blend of "micro computer" and "software", when he first
dropped the software it was a success for a while then people began pirating the
software and producing them for free thereby making the company to lose income but
he found a way out by writing software in different formats for other computer
companies. From they began partnership with companies like IBM, Apple, etc...
Although there rivalry was legend, Apple and Microsoft shared some of their early
innovations together, Apple gave Microsoft full access to their technology because
it was working on making Microsoft products compatible for their users, Bill
advised Apple to license their product but Apple ignored their advised, Bill took
full advantage of this situation to create a software strikingly similar to that of
Apple. Apple threatened to sue Microsoft but Microsoft retaliated by saying it
would delay, it shipment of it's Microsoft compatible software for it's Apple
users, In the end, in courts Microsoft prevailed thereby leading to the end of
their partnership. In the year 1987 Bill gates became one of the youngest ever
billionaire at age 31, at age 44 in the year 2000, he steeped down and handed over
CEO to Steve Balmer.
In that same year, he and his wife Melinda Gates
formed a philanthropic foundation named Bill and Melinda gates foundation, it was
focused on health, poverty alleviation, vaccines, etc....Later Bill and some other
billionaires came together and formed a pledge known as the giving pledge, where
they pledged to give half of their wealth to charity. Bill got divorced with his
wife thereby resulting to her leaving the organization, it was later renamed the
gates foundation. Bill gates story is indeed an astonishing one for even when
obstacles came his way he always found a solution, as bill gates will say, if you
show people the problems and show them the solution they will be moved to act.
