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Microsoft is Founded
Microsoft was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, this had started with Paul's fascination with the Altair 8800 Microcomputer which had been the world's first microcomputer kit to rival commercial models. They spent a year working to develop an implementation of BASIC (a general-purpose high-level programming language) for the microcomputer. The system they built had been a success and had been sold by Altair's manufacturer, becoming the first product to be developed by Microsoft -
Registered Company Name
Microsoft became a registered company name. It's a hyphenated version of microcomputer and software. This had opened the window to produce software for the electronics firm MITS. They reached a million dollars in sales by 1978. -
First International Office in Japan
They opened their first international sales office in Toyko, Japan, in the same year, called ASCII Microsoft. This had been done due to a partnership with Kazuhiko Nishi, founder of ASCII Corporation in Japan. -
Relocating the Company
As the Microsoft company was growing they decided to relocate from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Bellevue, Washington as it was difficult to hire skilled programmers. This allowed them to grow in employees, sales and future products and software. -
Expanding into Europe
Microsoft expanded into Europe, being their first entry into the European market. This had been done with the help of Vector International as they signed to represent Microsoft. As a result, Vector Microsoft opened in Belgium. -
Xenix and Z-80 SoftCard
The Xenix, had been their first operating system that was launched this year. During the same year, the Z-80 SoftCard, their first hardware product had was launched. This hardware allowed Apple computers to use a CP/M operating system. This had become the main source of revenue of that year. -
IBM Operating System
IBM approached them to develop an operating system for their upcoming PCs, and gave out the contract for them to develop a CP/M operating system in 1980. IBM released the PC and marketed the CP/M and MS-DOS versions for a cheap price from 240-40 dollars. This success helped Microsoft as many consumers and enthusiasts had kept the company in mind. -
International Divison
Microsoft set up their first international division in Europe. This had been aimed to find local agents that could be hired to handle overseas business deals for their markets. -
Microsoft Word
Microsoft released a word processing software called Multi-Tool Word, which we know as Microsoft Word. This brought a lot of attention since it was more innovative than what was currently on the market. They had also released a Microsoft Mouse which was given for free with every purchase of Word. -
Developing the European Market and APAC Region
Microsoft opened subsidiaries in three of the major European market, which was France, Germany and the United Kingdom. They were in charge of selling and developing into the market. The company also accessed direct distribution into the APAC Region (Asia-Pacific countries) by the purchase of Wiser Laboratories Pty, Ltd. in Australia. -
First Version of Windows
Released the first version of Windows which was initially launched as a GUI for the MS-DOS but soon became its own software -
First Oversea Manufacturing Facility
Microsoft built its first production facility outside of the United States, in Dublin, Ireland. This was meant to be the duplication and distribution center for their products to be sold in the European market. As well as what the overseas facility produced, they were eventually sent to the U.S. production facility. -
Opened Microsoft de Mexico
The company opening an office in Mexico had been the first Latin American subsidiary for Microsoft but as well as the first office being opened in Latin America by any U.S. software company. -
Relocating the Company
Microsoft had moved from Bellevue, Washington to Redmond, Washington. They opened their first headquarters there. -
Microsoft bought Forethought
Microsoft bought Forethought, which were the developers for what we know as PowerPoint today. -
Microsoft Office
Microsoft launches Microsoft Office, which included the programs, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Note and more. -
Microsoft European Headquarters
The European Headquarters opens in Paris, this allowed operations internationally to increase to 55% annually. -
Windows 3.0
Windows 3.0 was launched and became a streamlined user interface. Windows OS and Microsoft Office helped Windows gain popularity among consumers and by 1993, it had become the more popular and widely used GUI-based operating system. -
Adding Distributors Internationally
Microsoft added distributors in Singapore, Indonesia, and Malaysia. The same year the company also opened a research and development center in Japan. -
Reorganized Operations Internationally
Microsoft reorganized their international operations this year. Europe had been divided into 3 regions and the rest of the operations remained in the Far East, Intercontinental, Latin America and AIME. -
Entering the Chinese Market
Microsoft tried to enter China in 1992. This had been an issue with the company as consumers responded negatively. They didn't meet the cultural or regulatory differences that China had. -
Legal Issues with Apple
Microsoft had legal issues with Apple over using portions of Apples QuickTime video code and had needed good PR for the company as well as to make the lawsuit go away. Microsoft settled for 150 million but came out with the story that Microsoft helped save Apple with an investment of $150 million and developed a series of applications for the Mac OS including a native version of Office. This had been due to the revenue issues that Apple was experiencing. The PR statement came out in 1997 -
Internet Explorer
Microsoft launched their first web browser, called Internet Explorer. This had been marketed for free since other competitors charged for their web browser software. They had also built the browser in the Windows operating system, which helped become the widely used internet browser. -
Expanding Headquarters and Legal Issues
The company decided to launch a headquarters in India, the second largest from the one in the United States headquarters. During this year, they also were in a legal battle with the Department of Justice for illegally reducing competition to protect its market share. -
Returning to China
Microsoft had assigned a senior executive to assess the issues they were having with expanding into China. They started to improve their relationship with the Chinese government. The company also reduced their prices to better compete in the market and meet the government restrictions. Their new and improved efforts gained Chinese market and it's now been a long-term success. -
More Legal Battles
Although they went through many legal battles, the revenues were still exceeding at a good rate, but they knew they had to restore their public image. This caused Bill Gates to retire as CEO and became Chief software architect and appoint Steve Ballmer as his replacement, which shifted the company in the identity and direction they were hoping for. This new change had improved revenue up to $558 billion. -
Entering the Gaming Market
They entered the gaming market by releasing the Xbox, its first gaming console and became a success after a while. Although you could argue that they've entered the gaming market since they released DirectX prior in 1995 for developers to handle game programming and multimedia in the new Windows Platform. -
Microsoft Azure
Microsoft launched its own cloud platform called Microsoft Azure, and became leaders in the cloud computing industry. -
Office 365
Microsoft was failing and struggled to realign with the shifts in software distribution and started to face competition from several tech companies. Google had a great rise so Microsoft debuted and launched Office 365 which was and is a popular product, and then soon acquired Skype, which had been their biggest acquisition at the time. -
Windows 8
They released Windows 8 which created more backlash and soon started rebranding the company with a new logo. -
Acquiring Nokia
Acquiring Nokia had helped with the Windows Phone OS and had rebranded to Microsoft Lumia, and eventually sold the company back. -
Mojang
They acquired Mojang, which had been the developer of Minecraft -
New CEO - Satya Nadella
They appointed Satya Nadella as the new CEO to help rebrand and he saved the company. He announced the office products would work with apple tablets, and a major product launch was Windows 10 in 2015. -
Acquiring LinkedIn
The company acquired LinkedIn, a business and employment social network platform. This increased their consumer market significantly. -
Acquiring GitHub
Microsoft acquired the world's largest software development platform that's based on open-source VCS software. To this date, it's the biggest acquisition they've done. -
Trillion Dollar Value
The company reached a trillion-dollar value, becoming the third tech company in the world to do so after Apple and Amazon