Paul Allen’s memoirs critical of Bill Gates
Paul Allen’s new memoirs offer a new take on the early days of Microsoft and are somewhat critical of Bill Gates. Like it really matters at this stage of the game.
Many of the greatest companies in the world, tech-based or otherwise, have been formed through partnerships. It takes more than one element to create success, with ideas married to a way with numbers, creativity married to level-headedness. However, partnerships, just like relationships, are often strained and end up coming apart at the seams.
One such partnership was that of Bill Gates and Paul Allen, who together founded Microsoft on April 4, 1975. The pair were friends with childhood who both shared a passion for computer programming. Between them they built the infrastructure and put the team together which would eventually make Microsoft one of the biggest companies the world has ever seen.
However, their friendship barely lasted the journey, with the pair drifting apart somewhat as the company grew. And according to Allen’s memoirs Idea Man: A Memoir by the Co-founder of Microsoft, due to be released on April 17, Gates didn’t always act in the most friendly or helpful way.
The Wall Street Journal recounts some of these incidents, including the time Gates and current CEO Steve Ballmer discussed diluting Allen’s shares in the company, and Gates asking for a higher percentage of shares but then refusing a similar request from Allen years later. Gates disagrees with the accounts in the book, and some of the pair’s colleagues at the time suggest this is something of a “revisionist history.”
We should remember at this point that we’re talking about two of the richest men in the world, Bill Gates at no. 2 with $56 billion, Paul Allen at no. 57 with $13 billion, according to the 2011 Forbes Rich List. So for all the arguing and bitching and moaning, these two people live a life of complete luxury thanks to the shares they hold in the company they built. So let’s not feel too sorry for either party, eh?
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