Microsoft was founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The company’s MS-DOS operating system, licensed to IBM for its personal computers in 1981, laid the foundation for decades of dominance. Windows, launched in 1985, became the world’s most widely used operating system.
Under CEO Satya Nadella (since 2014), Microsoft transformed from a Windows-centric company into a cloud-first powerhouse. Azure has grown into the second-largest cloud platform globally, with over $60 billion in annual revenue. Microsoft 365 (formerly Office 365) moved Word, Excel, and Outlook into the cloud and switched to subscription pricing.
Microsoft’s strategic investment of $13 billion in OpenAI has positioned it at the center of the generative AI boom. Copilot, powered by OpenAI’s models, has been integrated across Microsoft’s product lineup — from GitHub Copilot for coding to Microsoft 365 Copilot for office productivity.
The company’s portfolio spans operating systems (Windows), productivity software (Microsoft 365), cloud computing (Azure), gaming (Xbox, Activision Blizzard acquired for $69 billion in 2023), professional networking (LinkedIn), and developer tools (GitHub, VS Code). Each of these is a multi-billion-dollar business.
Microsoft’s market cap has exceeded $3 trillion, making it one of the two or three most valuable companies in the world. Annual revenue surpassed $227 billion in fiscal year 2024. Headquartered in Redmond, Washington, Microsoft employs over 220,000 people globally.
