well microsoft was the first
software company where
rewrote software for personal computers
and we believe
that we could hire the best engineers
there was a
unbelievable amount of software to be
written
and
we could do it well we could do it on of
global basis
uh... to
original
customer base
was the
hardware manufacturers
and resold
to literally hundreds and hundreds
uh... over a hundred companies in japan
over a hundred companies doing
word processors in industrial control
type things
we know in the long run we wanted to
sell suffered directly to users
but we actually didn't get around that
till nineteen eighty
when we had uh... our first sort of
deans and
uh...
uh... productivity software that
that people would go to a computer store
in actually by the the software package
we actually
talked about it
unit article
and i think nineteen
seventy seven was the first time it
appears in print
where we say a computer on it on every
destin and every home
and actually did
pick we said running microsoft software
if we were just talking about the vision
we'd leave
that those last three words out
uh... if we were
document internal company
discussion
we put those words and
and
it's very hard to
recall
crazy and wild that was you know on
every desk and in every form
you know at the time you have
people who are very smart same
you know why would somebody needed
computer or even ken olsen
who would run this company digital
equipment
who made the computer i grew up with
and you know that we admired
both him and his company immensely
was saying that
this seemed kinda a silly idea
that people would want to have a
computer
when
ibm
saw that we had written supper for all
the personal computers
they came to us sought or advice on the
design
but we said you should put it this can
and since they wanted to ship very
quickly
another company
uh...
called digital research
had done that work
for the eight bit machines
and they were starting to do a version
for this new these new sixteen machines
we commenced by the end of the sixteen
bit machine
using this
eighty eighty six eighty d eight
processor will be entered research
really hadn't finished the work
and that idea was getting frustrated
because they're doing research
when sign even a non-disclosure
agreement
and then some of us uh... particularly
paul
and uh...
key person in kozhikode nishi
uh...
was from japan worked with us
said no no no we should just do that
ourselves
and because of a quick timing
we end up licensee me original called
from another company
uh...
and turned that into m_s_ toss
and
so then
subsequently m_s_ tossed competed with
this digital research cpm
uh... after about two or three years and
messed osx
became far far more popular
uh... then
than cpm and then eventually we would
pecan ad
graphics capability on top of m_s_ toss
and then integrate the two together
and said today when we talk about
windows
and actually include
although zen estilo slings in it that's
the full operating system
alarm also you think of the graphics in
windows and stuff there's a lot of
more classic operating system capability
that that's built in there
they are the end initial bill is a flat
fee deal uh... another flat the deal
it had certain restrictions
that prevented i_b_m_
from selling to other hardware makers
so people did
i_b_m_p_c_ compatible machines
we would get the revenue by doing
business directly with those people
and that the deal was very complicated
but it was a deal that
steve balmer who's a key person of the
company by that time
and i thought a lot about
and it was that they really
junior team from i_b_m_ so we tried to
make sure that given our belief that
personal computers would be hyper
popular
that microsoft would get
a lot upside so
they felt they got a very good deal
which they did
as the industry expanded
we uh...
for numbers and some for different
machines we dot that opportunity even
though they did not pay so royalty
even in the early days of the set a
computer on every desk every home and
you'd say okay how many homes are there
on the world how many decir on the world
you know can i make twenty bucks for
every home twenty bucks for every desk
if you get these big numbers
part of the beauty of the
hoping was
we were very focused on the here and now
should we hire one more person
ip our customers
didn't pay s
what we have enough cash to meet the
payroll
we really were very practical about
that next thing and so involved in
the deep into the ring
that we didn't get ahead of ourselves we
never thought
you know how big we'd be i remember
when uh... will your lead lists of
wealthy people came out
and
uh... one of the intel founders was
there
pic i ran wayne
computer section still
women still doing well and we thought
within boy at the software business does
well
nevada microsoft could be
summer to that but it wasn't real focus
state
the everyday activity of
doing great software
through a stand
decisions we made like the quality of
the people the way we were very global
that vision of
uh...
uh... how we thought about software that
was very long term
but you know other than those things you
know we just came in to work every day
in
uh...
wrote more quote
you know hired
hired more people
it wasn't really until the idea of pc
succeeded and perhaps even into windows
succeeded that
there was a broad awareness that
microsoft
was very unique
as a software company that these other
companies have been one product
companies
have heart
people could do a broad set of things
didn't renew their accidents tend to
research
uh... so
and we've got your
doing something very unique but it was
easily
i'm not until nineteen ninety five or
even nineteen ninety-seven that
that there was this wide recognition
that we
we where the company that had
had revolutionized software
when i was very young
had been exposed to computers so i was
mostly just free team
doing math learning about science
and i wasn't sure what
my critique
i knew i loved
alarming about things i was an avid
reader
but it was when i was twelve years old
that i
i first got use a computer
actually a very
limited machine by today's standards
uh... back but that
definitely fascinated me when i was
first exposed
i was intrigued
uh... by figuring out what to do but
couldn't do
and some friends of mine
lots of time uh... the teachers got
intimidated so we were on our own
trying to figure it out actually gave
course on computers
uh... to the other students
and it became
you know a fascination where
uh... we
got paid for doing computer work and
talked about forming a accompany
uh... but
there was kind of a magical breakthrough
in the computer
became
uh...
and
we could see that
everyone could afford a computer
uh... that was
much later
uh... but id
uh... that's what got us to
really get interim and create company
for software
yet map was the thing that uh... k most
natural to me
and
you need to make peace
exams some which were sort of nationwide
exams and
uh... i did quite well almost
gave me some confidence and i had some
teachers were very christine
uh... they
let me read text books they encourage me
to take
uh... college course on
symbolic math which is actually called
algebra
uh...
so i i felt
it pretty confident in my math skills
which is a nice thing because
uh... not only the sciences but
economics a lot of things
if you're
comfortable
uh... with math and statistics and
weighs in
looking at cause-and-effect
uh... that's extremely helpful
computers were immensely
expensive
uh... and cost millions of dollars a
machine that
was far less powerful and
from what you have a m
a cell phone
today and so that
either you do
have a very
important application
or you to share the machine with other
people and still you had to pay quite a
bit of money
and sometimes turns worrier connected up
in and sharon machine
it's a lot better then
sending their programs and because you
can see
when you make a mistake
uh... pretty quickly
even so because they charge is so much
we'd actually typed the programs
offline on a paper t
uh... so that we didn't
have any delay for typing
and then when we got onto the computer
we'd feeding on that tape
uh... so that
that was less less time online
but it gave you a sense look at what you
got right and wrong and you could try
and cracked things
uh... we also
because at that time the dominant form
of computing misusing punch cards
we exceeded that quite a bit we're down
at the university of washington use some
of those
punch card systems
as computers became less expensive
so-called many computers
that more people had access mostly
scientists and business people
but also we
managed to find
machines that were being used at night
the idea of the machine is something
that an individual would use and that it
would just sit there idle when they
weren't using them
dot only made sense
about a decade later
when the work that we and others have
done
had gotten a the price down so
dramatically
the idea of a computer sitting idle unit
doesn't feel like some q_-two waste of
resources
alike
uh... it did when they were
so uh...
expensive and rare
i went through several phases of doing
more complex programs
where people who were great programmers
would look at my work give me feedback
on it
and
you get to you
you camille quite a good programmer
and it was kind of a such a
uh... intense activity
between the age of thirteen and
seventeen
uh... that
you know we learned a allot
uh... densely welded
programs which were calm was
the idea of the scheduling of
uh... bar school when should the classes
mean who should be what sections they
are all these requests
people who want different classes and
keeping them small and not having the
teachers teach too many
classes around
very complex kind of software problem
inaction of the school first asked me to
do it
uh... when i was fifteen
i said that i i didn't know how
an awsome adults to do it not
didn't work
uh...
and many
about a year later i'd figured out how
to do it
and so my friends and i actually did the
software
did all this high school scheduling
uh... betrayed some fantastic
uh... benefits to us
and we got paid for doing it
it was exactly the kind of com complex
problem that
now develop my skills very well
and you know we got
some degree of
control over
who is on our classes and
uh...
so you know it combined the best of
everything
well my parents have been
fantastic
throughout
my whole student career mean getting me
to go lakeside
uh... that
my senior at lakeside word one and two
take time off and do this job it to your
w they've been very supportive about
letting live down in vancouver
washington
i decided to show some a little bit
where and some of that
mike orchestra w so they should skip
undergraduate school graduate school
and they were not do just about that
it looks like tight
would have an option you do that but i
didn't i
i'd just went to harvard
and that was another case where they
were right that in a socially demand
other undergraduates was good
i want to take graduate courses up at
m_i_t_
and i did that too limited degree so i i
kinda had the best of both worlds anyway
when it came time to be
uh... go on leave
from harvard
the policies of the school about if your
garden
letting you come back work
credibly generous
and so
if he had a price it failed
then
and i would have been back into my
parents
we're a little surprised
and kind of
wondering what it meant
uh... but they were pretty supportive
and in fact when we got into this legal
dispute
uh... with per checked
you know my dad gave me good advice he
was
supportive on on that
and so we saw that
through
and
you know that is the company became
successful a
you know i hope they felt better about
it
nearly all the really bad case was if it
if i stayed
and the company of was kinda mediocre
lee successful that they'll that would
be okay if it
was a big success it would be okay maybe
you know they could see i was
very energized and
i thought
in we needed to get in at the very
beginning and not waste a year or two
which is what i have left of mine
uh... undergraduate course requirements
well i think the american dream is this
kind of a global dream now that young
people
can come up with new ideas and
and create
companies that make a contribution not
just jobs that whatever their
innovations that they bring about
no capitalism is this unbelievable open
system that if you combine it with
uh... good infrastructure good education
their creativity
that we find
uh... for people who've had that those
cancers
is always going to surprise us it's
always going to come up with new seeds
new medicines and software
the movies you know things that are
or make the world a better place
microsoft
was at the center of the personal ck
computer revolution in particularly
intimidate creation of a software market
we went out to lots of companies and
courage them to write software
for different applications monday now
applications
wild up occasions
that idea that
you would encourage people to be
creative and build saw for maybe a whole
industry around that
uh... microsoft we didn't have no one
else did
and so we got that going
and that's led now to where you have all
these great choices and it just keeps
getting better and better ants because
of the following the machines out there
it can be sold very very inexpensively
sadat
all bootstrap getting the industry going
making a it personal making them be lots
of software that's what we or the most
proud of
the foundation not started uh...
in the late nineties with my dad
encouraging mean
uh... an executive named patty stone
separate
uh... left microsoft
or helping out high was still
very busy
our kids were
uh... very young
uh... but we got going
put computers in libraries in many
different countries including the united
states
we did some scholarship things
we were learning about
uh...
reproductive health and and population
issues
and i kept growing
and we met people
though about back scenes and
sos
a part-time thing
a global health was a bit over half
uh... the u_s_ focused uh... library
scholarship education work was over a
quarter
uh... that there was a final peace
relates to other things
the poorest other than just and health
uh... things things like
finance in savings
an eight in our group
then i saw that
uh... i could make
unique contribution aaron created to
transition plan uh... that was
four years in the making
and so now im full-time at the time
dation
and
plane rolled
being the chairman and
traveling a lot concerts you know it's
equally challenging it's very fulfilling
it's taking this these resources on
lucky enough to have because of the
success of microsoft
in giving those back to that the society
in a way that can have the biggest
impact
