Bill Gates – Biography, Age, Family, Divorce, Net Worth
Bill Gates Biography
William Henry Gates III is an American philanthropist and businessman who was born in Seattle, Washington, on October 28, 1955.
He helped transform personal computers by co-founding Microsoft with his childhood friend Paul Allen.
Until 2014, he was the company’s biggest shareholder and had held the positions of chairman, CEO, president, and chief software architect.
In the 1970s and 1980s, Gates played a pivotal role in the microcomputer revolution. His mother, Mary Maxwell Gates, was a business magnate, and his father, William H. Gates Sr., was a prominent attorney. She served on the boards of United Way of America and First Interstate BancSystem. His family is of English, German, and Irish/Scots-Irish descent, and he has two sisters, Kristi and Libby.
Bill Gates Educational Background
Bill Gates enrolled in the exclusive prep school Lakeside when he was thirteen. Later, in 1973, he enrolled at Harvard after receiving a SAT score of 1590 out of 1600. He departed after two years, despite taking advanced computer science and maths classes.
When the MITS Altair 8800 came out in 1975, Gates and Paul Allen recognised an opportunity to launch a software business.
With his parents’ help, Gates left Harvard that same year, knowing he could always come back if things didn’t work out.
Bill Gates Career
In the eighth grade at Lakeside School, Bill Gates became interested in computers after learning how to program and making a game called tic tac toe.
He eventually secured a deal to test software in exchange for computer time when he and Paul Allen figured out how to gain access to computer systems.
In 1975, after seeing the Altair 8800 computer, Gates and Allen convinced MITS they were developing a BASIC interpreter. They quickly built one, leading to a deal with MITS, he then left Harvard to start “Micro-Soft,” later renamed Microsoft in 1976.
Microsoft grew quickly, but Gates was frustrated by software piracy. In 1976, he wrote An Open Letter to Hobbyists, arguing that developers deserved payment.
Microsoft became independent of MITS in 1979, and in 1981, Gates became president and chairman. That year, he co-wrote DONKEY.BAS, a simple driving game.
Bill Gates Age
Bill Gates was born October 28, 1955, he is 70 years old as of 2025.
Bill Gates Personal Life
In addition to being an avid reader, Bill Gates likes to play tennis, golf, and bridge. He plans every minute of his day, Gates travelled in economy class until 1997, when he purchased a private jet.
For $30.8 million, Gates acquired the Codex Leicester, a compilation of Leonardo da Vinci’s scholarly writings, in 1994.
A record price for an American painting was set four years later when he paid $30 million for the maritime picture Lost on the Grand Banks, created in 1885.
He revealed in 2016 that he is colour-blind. In 2025, Gates expressed his belief that he had autism in Source Code.
Bill Gates Family
Melinda French and Bill Gates met at a New York trade show in 1987. She had recently begun working at Microsoft after graduating from Duke University.
In 1993, Gates and Melinda became engaged after six years of dating, and on January 1, 1994, they were married at the Manele Golf Course on the Hawaiian Island of Lānaʻi.
The couple had three children, two girls and one boy: Jennifer (born April 26, 1996), Rory (born May 23, 1999), and Phoebe (born September 14, 2002)
. They lived in a large, earth-sheltered house built into a hillside overlooking Lake Washington in Medina, Washington. Bill
Gates became a grandfather in March 2023 when his eldest daughter, Jennifer, who married Olympic equestrian Nayel Nassar in October 2021, gave birth to a daughter. Jennifer had a second daughter in October 2024.
Bill Gates Foundation
In 1994, Gates donated some of his Microsoft stock to create the “William H. Gates Foundation.”
In 2000, he and his wife merged three family foundations and donated $5 billion worth of stock to create the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. By 2013, it was recognized as the world’s largest charitable foundation, with assets valued at over $34.6 billion.
The foundation is transparent about how its funds are spent, unlike many other major charities.
Additionally, Gates gave $20 million through the foundation to Carnegie Mellon University for the construction of the Gates Centre for Computer Science, a new facility that opened in 2009. Global Development, Global Health, U.S. Programs, Global Policy & Advocacy, and Global Education are the foundation’s five primary areas of focus.
It funds a range of public health initiatives, such as the development of vaccines to eradicate polio and the fight against diseases including AIDS, TB, and malaria. It also provides funding for scholarships, libraries, and educational institutions.
The organisation promotes agricultural initiatives including the creation of Golden Rice to combat vitamin A deficiency and runs a program for water, sanitation, and hygiene to aid underdeveloped nations.
The foundation also strives to give girls and women in underdeveloped nations access to family planning.
Bill Gate Net Worth
As of 2025, Gates worth $165 billion, he has diversified his wealth from Microsoft into other holdings, including waste disposal firm Republic Services and tractor maker Deere & Co.
