William Henry Gates III, or Bill Gates for short, was born on October 28, 1955 in Seattle, Washington. Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft Corporation. He wrote his first software program at the age of 13. When he was a sophomore at Harvard University he joined his friend Paul G Allen to develop software for the first microcomputers.

He left Harvard during his junior year and formed Microsoft with his friend Paul. Microsoft licensed the operating system called MS-DOS to IBM - the biggest computer seller in the world - for use in the companies first microcomputer. By the 1990's Bill Gates became the PC kingmaker due to everyone being dependent on him for crucial software.

Bill Gates became a billionaire in 1986 due to him being the largest shareholder in Microsoft. Over the next decade this grew to the tens of billions. He preferred to be out of the public eye and handle his affairs through one of his foundations. He drew the attention from the U.S. Justice Department's Antitrust Division and reluctantly became and more public person.