Gatesset off forHarvard University intending to become a lawyer like his father. Still shy and awkward, he rarely ventured out to parties unless dragged by his friend Steve Ballmer, whom he later repaid by naming him president of Microsoft.

One day in December 1974, Allen, who was working at Honeywell outside of Boston, showed Gates a Popular Mechanics cover featuring the Altair 8800, a 7 computer from M.I.T.S. computing that any hobbyist could build. The only thing the computer lacked, besides a keyboard and monitor, was software. Gates and Allen contacted the head of M.I.T.S. and said they could provide a version of BASIC for the Altair.

After a successful demonstration at the company'sAlbuquerqueheadquarters, M.I.T.S. contracted with Gates and Allen for programming languages. The pair moved to New Mexico and started Micro-soft. Although the company's first five clients went bankrupt, the company struggled on, moving to Seattle in 1979. The following year, IBM asked Gates to provide an operating system for its first personal computer. Gates purchased a system called QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System) for ,000 from another company, changed the name to MS-DOS, and licensed it to IBM. The IBM PC took the market by storm when it was introduced in 1981.

Microsoft continued concentrating on the software market, adding consumer applications like Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel. In 1986, when the company went public, Gates became a billionaire at the age of 31. The following year, the company introduced its first version of Windows, and by 1993 it was selling a million copies a month. When Windows 95 was introduced in August 1995, seven million copies were sold in the first six weeks alone. Microsoft's software became soubiquitousthat the U.S. Justice Department began a series of long-lastingantitrust investigationsagainst the company.

In 1995, Gates dramatically changed the direction of the entire company and focused on the Internet.

In November 1999, the U.S. District Court issued apreliminary decisionthat the software giant was a monopoly, signaling continued trouble for both Gates and the Microsoft Corporation. Shortly after the ruling, Gates stepped down as Microsoft's CEO and assumed the position of chairman and chief software architect.

Under the 1999 ruling, Microsoft was required to release the Windows 2000operating codeto manufacturers. In April 2000, the Justice Department proposed that Microsoft should be divided into two companies. One company would develop software mainstays like Microsoft Office and Internet Explorer, while the other would solely concentrate on the Windows operating systems (which currently run on 85% of the world's computers). And in late July 2001 a federal appeals courtunanimouslyoverturned the lower court's order tobreak upMicrosoft.

With a reportedfortuneof billion, Gates retained the top spot in a 2001 Forbes magazine survey of the 400 wealthiest Americans.