FREE ESSAY ON MICROSOFT

MICROSOFT

MICROSOFT
Briarcliffe College
Microsoft Corporation, leading American computer software company. Microsoft develops and
sells a wide variety of computer software products in more than fifty countries.
Microsoft's Windows operating systems for personal computers are the most widely use
operating systems in the world. Microsoft had revenues of $14.4 billion for the fiscal
year ending June 1998, and employs more than 27,000 people in 60 countries. Microsoft has
it's headquaters in Redmond Washington.
Microsoft's other well known products include, Word, a word processor; Excel, a
spreadsheet program; Access, a database program; and PowerPoint, a program used for
making business presentations. These products are sold separately from Windows as a part
of Microsoft Office. Microsoft also makes Back Office, an integrated set of server
products for businesses. Microsoft's Internet Explorer allows users to browse the World
Wide Web. Among Microsoft's other products are reference applications; games; finical
software; programming languages for software developers (eg; Visual Basic) ; input
devices, such as pointing devices and keyboards; and computer related books.
Microsoft operates The Microsoft Network (MSN), a collection of news, travel, financial,
entertainment, and information Web sites. Microsoft and the National Broadcasting Company
(NBC) jointly operate MSNBC, a twenty four hour news, talk, and information cable
television channel and companion Web site.
Microsoft was founded in 1975 by William H. Gates III and Paul Allen. The pair had teamed
up in high school via their hobby of programming on the original PDP-10 computer from the
Digital Equipment Corporation. In 1975 Popular Electronics magazine featured a cover
story about the Altiar 8800, the first personal computer. The article inspired Gates and
Allen to develop the first version of the BASIC programming language for the Altiar. They
licensed the software to Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), the Altiar's
manufacturer, and formed Microsoft (originally Micro-soft) in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to
develop versions of BASIC for other computer companies. Microsoft's early customers
included fledgling hardware firms such as Apple Computer, maker of the Apple II computer;
Commodore, maker of the PET computer; and Tandy Corporation; maker of the Radio Shack
TRS-80 computer. In 1977 Microsoft shipped it's second language product, Microsoft
FORTRAN, and it soon released versions of BASIC for the 8080 and the 8086
microprocessors.
In 1979 Gates and Allen moved the company to Bellevue, Washington, a suburb of their
hometown Seattle. ( Microsoft moved to it's current headquaters in Redmond in 1986.) In
1980 International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) chose Microsoft to write the
operating system for the IBM PC personal computer, to be introduced the following year.
Under time and pressure, Microsoft purchased QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System) from
Seattle programmer Tim Paterson for $50.000 and renamed it MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk
Operating System). As part of it's contract with IBM, Microsoft was permitted to license
the operating system to other companies. By 1984 Microsoft had licensed MS-DOS to 200
personal computer manufacturers, making MS-DOS the standard operating system for personal
computers and driving Microsoft's enormous growth in the 1980's.
As sales of MS-DOS took off, Microsoft began to develop business applications for
personal computers. In 1982 Microsoft released Multiplan, a spreadsheet program, and the
following year, it released a word processing program, Microsoft Word. In 1984 Microsoft
was one of the few established software companies that to develop application software
for the Macintosh, a personal computer developed by Apple Computer. Microsoft's early
support for the Macintosh resulted in tremendous success for it's Macintosh Application
software, including Word, Excel, and Works (an integrated software suite). Multiplan for
MS-DOS, however, faltered against the popular Lotus Development Corporation.
In 1985 Microsoft released Windows, an operating system that extended the features of
MS-DOS and employed a graphical user interface. Windows 2.0 released in 1987, improved
performance and offered a new visual appearance, In 1990 Microsoft released a more
powerful version, Windows 3.0, which was followed by Windows 3.1 and 3.11. These versions
which came preinstalled on most personal computers, rapidly became the most widely used
operating systems. In 1990 Microsoft became the first personal computer software company
to record $1 billion in annual sales.
As Microsoft's dominance grew in the market for personal computer operating systems, the
company was accused of monopolistic business practices. In 1990 the Federal Trade
Commission (FTC) began investigating Microsoft for alleged anticompetitive practices, but
was un able to reach a decision and dropped the case. The United States Department of
Justice continued the probe.
In 1991 Microsoft and IBM ended a decade of collaboration when they went separate ways on
the next generation of operating systems. IBM chose to pursue the OS/2 operating system
(first released in 1987), which until then had been a joint venture with Microsoft.
Microsoft chose to evolve it's Windows operating system into increasingly powerful
systems. In 1993 Apple lost a copyright infringement lawsuit against Microsoft that
claimed Windows illegally copied the design of Macintosh's graphical interface. The
ruling was later upheld by an appellate court.
In 1993 Microsoft released Windows NT, an operating system for business environments. The
following year Microsoft and the Justice Department reached an agreement that called for
Microsoft to change the way it's operating system was sold and licensed to computer
manufacturers. In 1995, Microsoft released Windows 95, which featured a simplified
interface, multitasking, and other improvements. An estimated 7 million copies of Windows
95 were sold world wide within seven weeks of it's release. 
In the mid 1990's Microsoft began to expand into the media, entertainment, and
communications industries, launching the Microsoft Network in 1995 and MSNBC in 1996.
Also in 1996 Microsoft introduced Windows CE, an operating system for hand held personal
computers. In 1997 Microsoft paid $425 million to acquire Web TV Networks, a manufacturer
of low cost devices to connect the televisions to the Internet. That same year Microsoft
invested $1 billion in Comcast Corporation, a United States cable-television operator, as
a part of an effort to expand the availability of high speed connections to the
Internet.
] In late 1997 the Justice Department accused Microsoft of violating it's 1994 agreement
by requiring computer manufactures that installed Windows 95 to also include Internet
Explorer, Microsoft's Software for browsing the Internet. The government contended that
Microsoft was illegally taking advantage of it's power in the market for computer
operating systems to gain control of the market for Internet browsers. In response,
Microsoft argued that it should have the right to enhance the functionality of Windows by
integrating the Internet related features into the operating system. Also in late 1997,
computer company Sun Microsystems sued Microsoft, alleging that Microsoft had breached a
contract for use of Sun's Java universal programming language by introducing Windows only
enhancements. 
Microsoft temporarily settled with the Justice Department in it's anti trust case in
early 1988 by agreeing to allow personal computer manufactures to offer a version of
Windows 95 that did not include access to the Internet Explorer. However in May 1988 the
Justice Department and 20 states filed broad anti trust suits charging Microsoft with
engaging in anticompetitive conduct. The suits sought to force Microsoft to offer Windows
without the Internet Explorer or to include Navigator a competing browser made by
Netscape Communication Corporation. The suits also challenged some of the companies
contract's and pricing strategies.
In June 1998 Microsoft released Windows 98, which featured integrated Internet
capabilities. in the following month Gates appointed Steve Ballamer, executive vice
President of Microsoft, to become it's president and take over most of day to day
business operations for he company.
The federal antitrust trial against Microsoft began in October 1998. Executives from Sun,
Netscape and several other computer software companies testified regarding their business
deals with Microsoft. In November 1998, in the separate case brought by Sun Microsystems,
a federal district court ruled against Microsoft on an injunction filed by Sun earlier
that year. The injunction forced Microsoft to revise it's software to meet Sun's Java
compatibility standards. Microsoft appealed the ruling. In 1999 Microsoft paid $5 billion
to telecommunications company AT&T Corporation to use Microsoft's Windows CE operating
system in devices designed to provide consumers with integrated cable -television,
telephone, and high-speed Internet services.
In my opinion, Microsoft will continue to take it's place as the dominant figure in the
computer software market for years to come. No other company in the world has such a
tight grip on it's industry or target market like Microsoft dose. By either squashing or
consuming it's competition Microsoft continues to grow and grow. Microsoft has such an
outstanding lead on all competition that it will be virtually impossible for any of it's
competitors to catch up. Microsoft has invested money in every single corner of the
computer software, communications and Internet industry. With revenues of over $14
billion just last year and prospects of over $20 billion for the year to come, the
possibilities for the growth and success of Microsoft are virtually inconceivable. We can
only sit back and wonder what new tricks or ideas Bill Gates and Microsoft have stashed
up their sleeve. The forecast for the future of Microsoft appears to be bright and sunny
with clear sky's providing a smooth ride into the next millennium.
Bibliography
Works Cited
Source #1
Jones-Yang,Dori.  The Empire Strikes Out  U.S. News & World Report 15 November 1999:
46-54.
Source #2
 Bill Gates Web Site- Microsoft Timeline  Nov. 1999: Microsoft.com. On-line. 10 Nov.1999.
[http://www.Microsoft.com/billgates/bio]
Source #3
Microsoft 1999 Annual Report
[www.Microsoft.com/msft/ar99/hs.htm]