Microsoft began when the ALTAIR 8800 appeared on the cover of a magazine entitled Popular Electronics, inspiring two young men Bill Gates and Paul Allen to develop BASIC language software for it. Today, Microsoft is the world’s largest software company and an undeniable force in the computing world. The products of Microsoft are used around the world, from every age to every nationality. Microsoft is the parent company of the Windows operating system, Explorer browser, the Office suite of programs (which include Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint and Access), the Xbox game system and the Zune music player. The company is ranked number 35 in the Fortune 500 in 2009 with revenue of $60.42 billion and a global workforce of 95,000. At present, the company has exhibited agility in responding to market conditions, and has been managing innovations well. Bill Gates and Paul Allen were motivated by a dream and a desire that started with a small magazine cover. The motivational strategies of a successful cutting edge corporation must go beyond the dream. The acts of Bill Gates and Paul Allen brought their dream to life, and made Microsoft a reality. Microsoft is motivated and inspired by how customers use their software to find creative solutions to business problems, develop breakthrough ideas, and stay connected to what's most important to them (Vault Career Intelligence, n.d., para 1).
Background
According to Microsoft (2003-2005), “Thirty years ago, Microsoft began with a dream of a computer on every desk and in every home. Today, for the more than 1 billion people we’ve reached, life has changed profoundly. Information is available instantaneously. Personal and professional connections are made easily. Products and services are sold conveniently. Progress is achieved more readily. But for more than 5 billion people, the opportunity to learn, connect, create, and succeed remains elusive.” This type of drive and motivation makes a dream into a reality and a company successful. Gates (2009) says it best “At Microsoft, success comes from our passion for creating value—value for customers, shareholders, and partners; value for our employees and the communities around the world where we do business.”
Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft in 1975 to develop and sell BASIC or Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code interpreters for the Altair 8800 a mail-order microcomputer (Company Histories, 2003). Microsoft did not become well-known until the development of MS-DOS in the 1980s a job for IBM that they received by default when IBM could not come to terms with their original choice for a developer. Microsoft did not have an operating system of their own so they purchased the rights to someone else’s for $75,000 and named the program MS-DOS and acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System. The terms of the agreement with IBM stated that IBM had the right to use a specific version of the program but Microsoft retained the right to sell the OS to other companies and consumers as well. Surprisingly MS-DOS became the leading OS and Microsoft revenues rose as quickly as their notoriety (Company Histories,2003). Operating systems were just the beginning for Microsoft beginning at Windows 1.01 and ending most recently at the release of Windows 7, which is said to be the better of the two past operating systems XP and Vista (Bishop,2004). Microsoft Office is produced by the Business Division of Microsoft and offers several programs intended for office use such as Excel, Publisher and Access but with the release of Office 2003 and the inclusion of Visio, Project, InfoPath and OneNote the program became indispensable to students and as well as office workers.
Their journey continued into game systems, computer hardware (keyboards, mice, etc.), MSN Internet portal, MSN Hotmail, MSN Messenger, MSNBC Cable network and the Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia and other entertainment products such as Zune, MSN TV, PC games