Foundations: Microsoft from BASIC to AI

Technology rarely follows a straight path. When I joined Microsoft in 1988, Bill Gates shared the origin story of how he and Paul Allen built the company. In early 1975, after Allen showed Gates the Altair 8800 on the cover of Popular Electronics, the two friends developed Altair Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code (BASIC), Microsoft’s first product. They founded the company on April 4, 1975. The name Microsoft, a portmanteau of “microcomputer” and “software,” captured their vision of a computer on every desk and in every home. Hearing that story firsthand gave me insight into the company’s entrepreneurial DNA and its culture of purposeful innovation.