William Henry "Bill" Gates III (born
October 28,
1955) is the co-founder,
chairman, former
chief software architect, and former
CEO of
Microsoft Corporation. He is also the founder of
Corbis, a
digital image archiving company.
Forbes magazine's
The World's Billionaires list has ranked him as the richest person in the world for the last twelve consecutive years. In 1999, Gates' wealth briefly surpassed $100 billion making him America's first
centibillionaire.
[3] According to the
Forbes 2004 magazine, Bill Gates's net worth was approximately $46.6 billion. When family wealth is considered,
his family ranks second behind the
Walton family.
[4][5]
Gates is one of the best-known entrepreneurs of the
personal computer revolution. He is widely respected for his foresight and ambition.
[6][7] He is also frequently criticized as having built Microsoft through unfair or unlawful business practices. Since amassing his fortune, Gates has pursued a number of
philanthropic endeavors, donating large amounts of money (about 52% of his total fortune) to various charitable organizations and scientific research programs through the
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, founded in 2000. In June 2006 he announced that he would move to a part-time role with Microsoft (namely surrendering the power of managing day-to-day operations) in 2008 to begin a career in philanthropy, but will remain as
chairman.
Bill Gates, his wife
Melinda and
U2's lead singer
Bono were collectively named by
Time as the 2005
Persons of the Year for their humanitarian efforts. That same year he was made an honorary
Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire by
Queen Elizabeth II, which would entitle him to be known as
Sir William Gates if he were a citizen of
Britain or the
Commonwealth. In 2006, Gates Foundation was awarded the
Premio Príncipe de Asturias en Cooperación Internacional. In a list compiled by the magazine
New Statesman in 2006, he was voted eighth in the list of "Heroes of our time".
[8]
