Paul Allen
Paul Gardner Allen was born in Seattle Washington on January 21, 1953. He is a business executive who founded Microsoft Corporation – a preeminent computer software company in the US, along with Bill Gates.
In his early years, he attended Lakeside School, a private school situated in Seattle, where he encountered Bill Gates.
Briefly, he attended Washing State University in Pullman, Washington. In 1974, he left college and transferred to Boston, Massachusetts after Bill Gates persuaded him to take a job as a programmer with Honeywell Inc., a leading manufacturer of automation and control systems.
The following year, Bill Gates and Paul Allen came across a magazine article about Altair 8800, otherwise known as the first personal computer. Both of them realized that Altair would need a user-friendly programming language to make it more marketable to consumers. In a span of two weeks, the two were able to come up with a functional version of the BASIC programming language for the Altair.
Afterwards, they licensed it to Micro Instrumentation Telemetry Systems (MITS) – also Altair’s manufacturer.
In 1975, both decided to move to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and manufacture Altair while doing business as Microsoft. Paul Allen also joined MITS as director of software but eventually quit the following year to focus on Microsoft.
In Microsoft, Paul Allen’s function was to develop some of the company’s most innovative and popular products, including Windows, Microsoft Word and the Microsoft Mouse.
Unfortunately, in 1982, he found out that he had Hodgkin’s Disease. In 1983, he left his job in Microsoft but remained on the company’s board of directors and maintained a sizable percentage of the company’s stock.
During the late 80s and early 90s, Microsoft’s stock increased thereby making him one of the world’s richest individuals. He divided his money on investments like ownership of National Basketball Association’s Portland Trail Blazers, National Football League’s Seattle Seahawks, and Charter Communications. He is also a major investor in DreamWorks SKG and the founder of the Experience Music Project.
In 2000, Paul Allen resigned as one of Microsoft’s board of directors.
Forbes profile for Paul Allen.
Time magazine named Paul Allen one of the Cyber Elite.
Paul Allen Family Foundation, a philanthropic organization.