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Our Blogs The BeerFiles Gates chose the right time to leave Microsoft
Our Blogs The BeerFiles Gates chose the right time to leave Microsoft | Gates chose the right time to leave Microsoft |
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| by Stan Beer | |
| Sunday, 29 June 2008 | |
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Page 2 of 3 Back in 1995, Gates, however, knew that Microsoft had
some time up its sleeve. The Internet was a sunrise industry and the
technology was still not there yet. Connections were slow, expensive
and unreliable. Internet business models were still being formulated.The problem for Gates and Microsoft was that the desktop was their playground not cyberspace. Ironically, Microsoft's biggest problem was its desktop dominance. It made and still makes massive profits from selling desktop operating systems and productivity software - two things that the Internet will eventually make redundant as money spinners. Gates and Microsoft continued on their merry way raking in the profits all the while knowing that it was a matter of time before a serious Internet-based adversary arose. And as the end of the millenium approached, the Microsoft killer arrived. While Gates was probably not aware of the launch of Google on September 7 1998, nor of the work of Larry Page and Sergei Brin at Stanford that preceded it. However, by the time the new millennium arrived Gates was almost certainly in no doubt what Microsoft was up against. Google was no Netscape and Gates knew it. Microsoft could not simply buy lookalike technology and crush Google. There was no lookalike technology - Page and Brin had developed the killer app. CONTINUED |
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