Bill Gates

Bill Gates
Born	William Henry Gates III 10/28/1955
Birthplace	Seattle, Washington, U.S.
Nationality	American
Occupation	Businessman, philanthropist, investor, author
Known for	Co-founding Microsoft, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Giving Pledge
Education	Harvard University (dropped out)
Children	3
Awards	Presidential Medal of Freedom (2016)
Website	https://www.gatesnotes.com/

William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955), better known as Bill Gates, is an American businessman, investor, philanthropist, and author. He co-founded Microsoft in 1975 with childhood friend Paul Allen. Gates was central to the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s and 1980s, serving as CEO for 25 years and turning the company into one of the world's most valuable corporations. Following the 1986 initial public offering, he became the world's youngest self-made billionaire in 1987 at just 31 years old. Forbes ranked him the world's wealthiest person for 18 out of 24 years between 1995 and 2017, including a straight 13-year run from 1995 to 2007. In 1999, his net worth topped US$100 billion briefly. He was the first centibillionaire in history.

Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, Gates attended the private Lakeside School before enrolling at Harvard University in 1973. Two years later, he dropped out to work on Microsoft. Beyond technology, he became one of modern history's most prominent philanthropists. He leads the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the world's largest private charity, and co-founded the Giving Pledge with Warren Buffett in 2010. Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century in 1999. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016.

Early Life

William Henry Gates III was born on October 28, 1955, in Seattle, Washington. His father, William Henry Gates II, was a prominent attorney. His mother, Mary Maxwell Gates, was a businesswoman and civic leader who served on the board of directors for several organizations, including First Interstate BancSystem and the United Way of America. He grew up in an upper-middle-class household with two sisters, Kristianne and Libby. His father was a partner at a Seattle law firm, while his mother's civic work exposed young Gates to business and community life early on.

Gates went to Lakeside School, an exclusive private prep school in Seattle, where his passion for computing took root. The school had a teletype terminal connected to a General Electric mainframe computer. In eighth grade, Gates became fascinated with programming. That's where he met Paul Allen, a student two years ahead of him. The two shared a genuine enthusiasm for computers, something that would eventually lead them to create Microsoft.

Gates and Allen spent considerable time on the school's computer terminals, often alongside other Lakeside students. They discovered bugs in the operating system of a Computer Center Corporation (CCC) PDP-10 computer and exploited them to get extra computer time. That landed them a ban from the system for part of the summer. Gates didn't let it stop him. He kept developing his programming skills throughout his Lakeside years. He and Allen built an early venture called Traf-O-Data, which used a computer to analyze traffic data from roadway counters. These projects honed both his technical abilities and his entrepreneurial instincts. During his time at Lakeside, Gates was recognized as a National Merit Scholar.

Education

In fall 1973, Gates enrolled at Harvard University. He studied mathematics and computer science, taking courses like Math 55 (a notoriously difficult freshman math course) and graduate-level computer science classes. Paul Allen had moved to the Boston area by then, and the two reconnected at Harvard. They continued talking about business ideas and the emerging world of personal computing.

In 1975, Gates and Allen saw a Popular Electronics cover story about the Altair 8800 microcomputer made by MITS (Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems). They contacted the company and offered to write a BASIC interpreter. The venture succeeded, and Gates realized the personal computer industry held enormous commercial potential. He left Harvard during his sophomore year. He later described it as a leave of absence rather than a formal withdrawal. That decision let him co-found Microsoft with Allen. Harvard awarded him an honorary degree, though he never completed his undergraduate studies.

Career

Founding and Early Growth of Microsoft

Gates and Allen formally started Microsoft in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1975. The name itself was a portmanteau of "microcomputer" and "software." Their first product was a BASIC programming language interpreter for the Altair 8800. Success with this product established Microsoft as a provider of programming language software for personal computers. They soon developed versions of BASIC and other languages for various microcomputer platforms.

A key moment came in 1980. IBM approached the company asking for an operating system for its upcoming personal computer, the IBM PC. Gates and Allen acquired an operating system called QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System), adapted it, and licensed it to IBM as MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System). Here's what mattered most: the licensing agreement let Microsoft keep the rights to license MS-DOS to other hardware manufacturers. That decision proved enormously consequential as IBM-compatible PCs spread throughout the 1980s.

Microsoft incorporated in 1981. Gates became president, chairman of the board, and chief executive officer all at once. Under his leadership, the company expanded into word processing, spreadsheets, and presentation applications. Windows, the graphical user interface layer on top of MS-DOS, began development in the mid-1980s. It would eventually dominate the personal computer market worldwide.

Microsoft's Rise to Dominance

On March 13, 1986, Microsoft went public. The initial public offering valued the company at roughly $520 million. The stock price that followed made Gates a billionaire by 1987, at age 31. He was the youngest self-made billionaire in history at that moment.

Late 1980s and 1990s saw Gates overseeing Microsoft's expansion across the software industry. Windows 3.0 (1990) brought widespread commercial success to the graphical user interface. Later versions like Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows NT locked in Microsoft's position as the dominant operating system provider for personal computers. The Office suite, bundling Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, became standard in business and education settings.

Gates's leadership style stood out for technical skill and competitive intensity. He was known for detailed product reviews and challenging his engineers and executives. Under his direction, Microsoft also entered the internet market with Internet Explorer, sparking intense competition with Netscape Communications. The "browser wars" drew major attention.

Microsoft's dominance caught antitrust regulators' notice. In 1998, the United States Department of Justice filed a lawsuit alleging monopolistic practices, particularly bundling Internet Explorer with Windows. Gates provided a videotaped deposition that attracted significant media coverage. In 2001, Microsoft settled with the Department of Justice, though the case had lasting effects on the company's practices and public standing.

Transition From CEO

In January 2000, Gates stepped down as chief executive officer. Steve Ballmer, a Harvard college friend who'd joined Microsoft in 1980, took the role. Gates moved into a newly created position: chief software architect. This let him focus on product strategy and technology development while stepping back from day-to-day management.

He remained chief software architect until June 2008, when he shifted to part-time work to devote more energy to philanthropy. On February 4, 2014, he stepped down as chairman of the board and became technology adviser to CEO Satya Nadella. In March 2020, he resigned from the Microsoft board entirely, though he kept his advisory role.

One interesting recent detail: Gates's reaction to Microsoft's billion-dollar OpenAI investment. CEO Satya Nadella said Gates initially showed skepticism about the bet, reportedly telling him, "Yeah, you're going to burn this billion dollars." Despite his doubt, the investment went ahead and has since become central to Microsoft's strategy.

Other Business Ventures

Gates has pursued several business and investment ventures outside Microsoft. Cascade Investment is his holding company, through which he manages a diversified portfolio. He also founded TerraPower, a nuclear energy company developing advanced reactor technology. In 2026, TerraPower drew attention for plans to build an advanced nuclear reactor, billed as an "artificial sun," at a former coal plant in the United States. The goal is providing clean energy as a fossil fuel replacement.

Breakthrough Energy is another Gates initiative. It invests in and backs companies developing clean energy technologies. He also chairs BEN (Branded Entertainment Network) and Gates Ventures, a private office handling initiatives in global health, education, and energy innovation.

Philanthropy

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Philanthropy has become one of the defining aspects of Gates's public life. In 2000, he and his then-wife Melinda French Gates established the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. It grew to become the world's largest private charitable organization. The foundation has focused on global health, education, and poverty reduction.

In global health, the foundation committed billions to fighting transmissible diseases. Tuberculosis, malaria, and polio received particular emphasis. It's funded vaccination programs, backed research into new treatments and prevention methods, and worked with governments and international organizations to strengthen health systems in developing countries. Gates's efforts here won praise for scale and impact, though they've also faced scrutiny about private philanthropic influence on public health policy.

Education initiatives included K-12 reform investments in the United States, supporting charter schools and developing new curriculum standards. Internationally, the foundation funded programs to improve educational access in developing countries.

After Gates and French Gates divorced in 2021, she resigned as co-chair in 2024. The organization was renamed the Gates Foundation, with Gates serving as sole chair.

The Giving Pledge

In 2010, Gates and billionaire Warren Buffett launched the Giving Pledge. The initiative invites the world's wealthiest individuals and families to commit to giving more than half their wealth to philanthropic causes, either during their lives or in their wills. It's attracted signatories from numerous countries and become one of history's most prominent philanthropic initiatives.

Personal Life

Gates married Melinda French on January 1, 1994, in Lanai, Hawaii. They had three children together. Their youngest daughter, Phoebe Gates, was reported in 2026 to be leading an artificial intelligence startup called Phia. She described it as something she wanted to build independently, separate from her family's fame.

In May 2021, Bill and Melinda Gates announced their divorce after 27 years of marriage. The dissolution was finalized later that year. It attracted significant media attention, particularly regarding Gates's prior association with financier Jeffrey Epstein.

His primary residence is a large estate called "Xanadu 2.0" in Medina, Washington, a Seattle suburb. In February 2026, a neighboring four-bedroom home adjacent to the estate listed at $4.8 million and went under contract within six days. The buyer remained unidentified.

Gates has spoken publicly about limiting his own children's technology use. He's among several technology industry figures who've imposed strict screen-time limits on their kids, even while their businesses profit from widespread digital use.

Recognition

Gates has collected numerous awards and honors throughout his career. In 1999, Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. He's appeared on the magazine's most influential people list multiple times since.

In 2016, Gates and Melinda French Gates received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama. The award recognized their philanthropic contributions, particularly in global health and education.

Forbes magazine has consistently ranked him among the world's wealthiest individuals. He held the top spot on the wealthiest people list for 18 out of 24 years between 1995 and 2017. As of February 2026, his net worth was estimated at roughly US$107.7 billion, placing him 18th globally among the wealthiest people.

Several documentary films have examined Gates's life. Netflix released the docuseries Inside Bill's Brain: Decoding Bill Gates in 2019, exploring his philanthropic work and problem-solving approach. In 2025, he published Source Code: My Beginnings, the first volume of a planned three-part memoir series.

Legacy

Gates's influence on technology and global philanthropy has been substantial. As Microsoft's co-founder, he played a central role in making the personal computer essential in business, education, and daily life. Windows and the Office suite became integral to computing worldwide. Microsoft's business model of licensing software to hardware manufacturers shaped the software industry for decades.

His shift from technology executive to philanthropist marked a significant change in expectations about extreme wealth. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's large-scale global health investments, particularly in vaccination programs and fighting malaria and polio, have influenced how philanthropic organizations approach public health challenges in developing countries. The Giving Pledge, co-founded with Warren Buffett, helped normalize major wealth transfer to charitable causes among the ultra-wealthy.

Gates has also been a prominent voice on climate change and clean energy. He invests in nuclear energy through TerraPower and in various clean energy technologies through Breakthrough Energy. His advocacy for pandemic preparedness, voiced in a widely watched 2015 TED Talk and in later statements, drew renewed attention during COVID-19.

Assessment of Gates's legacy remains ongoing. His contributions to technology and philanthropy are widely recognized. Still, his Microsoft business practices during the antitrust disputes of the late 1990s and aspects of his personal life have also drawn scrutiny. As of 2026, Gates remains active in both his philanthropic and business work, maintaining his technology adviser role at Microsoft and serving as chair of the Gates Foundation.