Bill Gates was born in Seattle, Washington, on October 28, 1955.
Bill Gates first planned to study as a lawyer at Harvard University, but he spent most of his time on computers.
In 1975, age 20, he co-founded Microsoft with childhood friend Paul Allen in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
They began by adapting BASIC, a popular programming language used on large computers, to use microcomputers.
Bill Gates sealed Microsoft's success in the mid-1990s by persuading the leading computer builders of that time to preload Microsofts software on every computer sold.
At age 31, 11 years after launching Microsoft, Bill Gates became a millionaire officially.
Bill Gates still owns around 100 million Microsoft shares, which's roughly 1.3 per cent of its shares.
Why was Bill Gates successful?
The combination of hard work, intelligence and business sense where the base of Bill Gates huge success
Bill Gates constantly pushed his employees to innovate and work harder. He also worked harder than his employees.
Bill Gates took risks; calculated risks he had confidence in himself, his team and the product.
Bill Gates today's success let him become the 20 years richest man in the world and received the honorary knight by Queen Elizabeth.