Microsoft Corporation is an American technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington, that supports the invention, manufacture, and licensing of computing-related goods and services.
It was registered in New Mexico in 1976, after being formed the previous year by two childhood friends.
See how Microsoft was founded and a brief summary of the company's history.
Microsoft History
The beginning
Before Paul Allen and Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft, they were avid computer geeks at a time when access to computers was hard to come by .
Allen and Gates even skipped high school classes to live and breathe in the school's computer room. Eventually, they hacked the school's computer and got caught , but instead of being expelled, they were given unlimited computer time in exchange for helping improve the school's computer performance.
With the help of partner Paul Gilbert, Gates and Allen ran their own small company, Traf-O-Data, while in high school and sold a computer to the city of Seattle for counting city traffic.
Bill Gates, Harvard dropout
In 1973, Gates left Seattle to attend Harvard University as a pre-law student. However, Gates' first love never left him, as he spent most of his time at Harvard's computer center, where belarus phone number data he continued to hone his programming skills. Soon Allen moved to Boston as well, working as a programmer and pushing Gates to leave Harvard so they could work together full-time on their projects . Gates was unsure of what to do, but fate intervened.
The Birth of Microsoft
In January 1975, Allen read an article in Popular Electronics magazine about the Altair 8800 microcomputer and showed it to Gates. Gates called MITS, the manufacturer of the Altair, and offered his and Allen's services to write a version of the new BASIC programming language for the Altair.
After eight weeks, Allen and Gates demonstrated their program to MITS, which agreed to distribute and market the product under the name Altair BASIC. The deal inspired Gates and Allen to form their own software company. Microsoft was founded on April 4, 1975, in Albuquerque, New Mexico—the home of MITS—with Gates as its first CEO.
Where can Microsoft go from here?
Microsoft’s reputation for its reluctance to embrace change is well-deserved, but the company appears to be moving forward with a renewed sense of purpose under Nadella’s watchful eye. Where could Microsoft go from here?
1. Deeper integration between GitHub and Azure
Microsoft has finally realized that the cloud is where the battle for dominance will be fought. As such, it is inevitable that Microsoft will leverage its GitHub acquisition to aggressively attack Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud services.
2. Renewed emphasis on voice search
Microsoft has never had much luck with its search business, but the company is playing the long game with emerging technologies like voice search. We're likely to see continued investment in voice from Microsoft from a technical perspective (i.e. more improvements/development of Cortana), as well as more potential acquisitions of emerging companies in the voice space.
3. Vigorous defense of your business
Microsoft's software may be unpopular with most consumers, but the company maintains an iron grip on the company thanks to its dominance in Office. While Microsoft will likely expand its horizons in the coming years, it will have to work hard to maintain its dominance over the company, especially in light of aggressive competition from startups like Box.
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