THE ULTIMATE BIOGRAPHY OF BILL GATES, THE SILICON VALLEY BILLIONAIRE
== Author: ELVIO ARMANDO TUOTO
William Henry Gates III was born in Seattle, Washington, USA, on October 28, 1955. His father William H. Gates II was an attorney and his mother Mary Maxwell Gates was a school teacher and chairperson of the United Way charity. Bill Gates has two sisters.
He started studying at Harvard University in 1973 where he met up with his childhood friend Paul Allen. Gates and Allen worked on a version of the programming language BASIC, that was the basis for the MITS Altair (the first microcomputer available). He did not go on to graduate from Harvard University in order to start what was to become the largest computer software company in the world, Microsoft Corporation.
In 1975 the company Micro-soft was formed, an abbreviation of microcomputer software. It soon became simply Microsoft ®.
The success of the company began with the MS-DOS computer operating system that Gates licensed to IBM. He also set about protecting the royalties that he could acquire from computer software by aggressively fighting against all forms of software piracy.
Bill Gates' Windows operating system is installed in 94% of PCs being sold worldwide.
With estimated liquid assets of $46.5 billion in 2005, William Henry Gates III is the wealthiest man in the world and has maintained this position for at least seven years.
Gates diversifies his wealth: He sells 20 million shares each quarter, reinvests through Cascade Investment in nontech companies, including big stakes in Cox Communications, Canadian National Railway, Republic Services.
He is also world's biggest philanthropist devoting more than $28 billion to The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with donations totaling more than $1 billion every year.
In March 2005 William H. Gates III received a knighthood from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of England, for his services in reducing poverty and improving health in the developing countries of the world. This Order is just an honorary one as only citizens that are British or a part of the Commonwealth receive the full Order.
Mr.Gates has handed the position of CEO of Microsoft over to Steve Ballmer. He now holds the positions of Chairman and Chief Software Architect. He lives in Medina, near Lake Washington, with his wife Melinda French Gates and their three children. Gates likes reading, golf and playing bridge.