We all know about Microsoft. It is one of the most successful IT companies. But do we know how it has become a tech giant! Let’s know about it.
It all started at the Lakeside School in Seattle in 1968 when Bill Gates and Paul Allen, two of the co-founders of Microsoft, attended their high school. Both of them were very passionate about technology and programming-related projects. That’s why they had managed to get access to their school’s computer system. Though there was a limitation to the usage Bill Gates and his friends spent a lot of time using the school’s computer. So, one day they were banned from using the school’s computer. Then they started the Lakeside programmer club to learn and earn some money from their programming knowledge.
The first client of the Lakeside Programmer Club was Computer Center Corporation, the company which banned them from using the school’s computer. The project was successful and led to more programming opportunities for the Lakeside Programmer Club. Bill Gates and Paul Allen got a great experience working with the Lakeside Programmer Club which eventually led them to establish Microsoft.
The multinational tech-giant company Microsoft was founded on April 4, 1975, by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Today, Microsoft has many offices and facilities in other countries. In 1986, Microsoft expanded their business in Japan. Microsoft’s biggest breakthrough came when it started working with the tech giant IBM. In 1980, IBM hired them to develop an operating system for their personal computer. At that time Microsoft was not capable of making an operating system so it bought an operating system known as 86-DOS from Seattle Computer Products and renamed it MS-DOS. After IBM launched their PC, MS-DOS became the dominant operating system in the market. Microsoft licensed their operating system to 70 other computer companies along with IBM, to solidify its market dominance across the operating system market.
In 1983, co-founder Paul Allen left the company due to illness. Two years later, Microsoft released Windows 1.0 to compete with Apple’s operating system. In 1986, Microsoft went public with an initial public offering (IPO) worth $350 million. It also acquired Forethought, the company famous for PowerPoint. Microsoft launched a package called MS Works, which would later become MS Office, the cornerstone of Microsoft’s business today.
In 1995, Microsoft released Windows 95, which was a huge success, selling 1 million copies in just four days and doubling the company’s valuation. Microsoft also launched MSNBC (The Microsoft National Broadcasting Channel), 50% of which they owned. They created Internet Explorer as their standard internet browser and owned 10% of Apple.
From 1996 to 1998, Microsoft expanded its business by creating subsidiaries and in this time the company’s valuation was nearly 261 billion dollars. During this time, they launched Windows XP, Xbox, and programming languages dotnet, C-Sharp etc are still used in programming websites and video games today. They almost captured all industries except mobile phones. Bill Gates didn’t think the mobile phone industry would grow much.
In 2010, Microsoft released its own smartphone, the Windows Phone, which did not do well as the market was already captured by Apple and others. Microsoft continued to release products such as Windows 7, Bing, Xbox 360, and MS Outlook. They acquired companies like Nokia and Skype.
In 2013, Microsoft was still worth hundreds of billions of dollars but was lagging behind other tech giants such as Netflix, Google, Facebook, and Amazon. The company decided to purchase a gaming company, Github which is a programming platform, as well as a social media site LinkedIn. However, the new CEO, Satya Nadella, was focused on cloud computing. Azure, Microsoft’s cloud computing service, made Microsoft one of the most valuable cloud computing companies in the world, right behind Amazon. In 2019, Microsoft became the most valuable company in the world.
From University students to corporate workers, our daily life can’t even go without the use of Microsoft’s tools. As one of the biggest technology firms in the world today, Microsoft offers goods and services for a variety of markets and niches, including enterprise softwares, cloud computing, gaming, and personal computers.
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Writer: MD. Imranul Kabir Tanim
Intern, Content Writing Department,
YSSE.