Microsoft was formed in Seattle by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975. They had created a version of the Basic operating system for use on the Altair, a successful Personal Computer kit. Later, in 1981, they were selected by IBM to develop the Operating System for the first IBM Personal Computer (PC). They realized that if they could strike the right deal with IBM they could control the PC business.
Their deal allowed them to retain ownership of the Operating System and also to licence it to the IBM clone manufacturers. In due course they renamed their operating system “Windows” and added a Microsoft word processor, “Word”, and later a spreadsheet “ Excel”. This package led Microsoft to dominate the market for PC software, a domination that persists to this day (2023).
In 2014, Satya Nadella became the leader of Microsoft and focussed its offerings on “Cloud” software. In 2016, Thomas Friedman identifies Cloud services as the “Supernova” of computer software. It allows companies to outsource their data storage and computer software development and management to the experts, the software companies. This turns out to be more efficient and cheaper than doing these services themselves and allows the companies to focus on their own products and services. Today, in 2023, Nadella has led Microsoft to be the runaway leader of companies providing cloud services. In 2022, Microsoft’s Cloud service revenue reached $102 billion, as Mike Evans reported in the 156th edition of “Cloud Wars”, his regular report on the leading providers of Cloud services. This makes Microsoft the leader by a good margin. Lately Microsoft has offered its customers leading security software as a part of its Cloud services. This success has made Microsoft the second richest technology company; second only to Apple. How did Apple become number one, you ask! That story is also in my book: Where there’s a Will, There’s a Way.
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