Bill Gates Net Worth | Biography, Family & Facts (2021)

Gates who was once the CEO of the company is now taken over by Satya Nadella is still in the top 10 richest men on the planet. Gates is also the youngest Billionaire in the world at an age of 31, with $1.25 Billion in his pocket in the year 1987.

Bill, who is the co-founder of Microsoft along with Paul, is now actively serving the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which is the biggest charitable organization. Bill Gates Net worth over time, since the year 2010 it is growing very consistently and is not like other billionaires. Here’s the list of gates net worth, according to Forbes and other reliable sources from 2010-21;

• 2010 Net Worth - $53 Billion

• 2011 Net Worth - $56 Billion

• 2012 Net Worth - $61 Billion

• 2013 Net Worth - $67 Billion

• 2014 Net Worth - $76 Billion

• 2015 Net Worth - $79 Billion

• 2016 Net Worth - $81 Billion

• 2017 Net Worth - $89 Billion

• 2018 Net Worth - $97 Billion

• Bill gates net worth 2019 - $106 Billion

• Bill gates net worth in 2020 - $111 Billion

Finally, in the year 2021, the title for the richest man on the planet was taken over by Bald smiling man, Jeff Bezos who is the founder of Amazon. After Jeff, Bernard Arnault, and Elon Musk, Gates is the 4^th richest man on the planet. The Net Worth of Bill Gates in 2021 is - $124 Billion USD, which is expected to rise more in the coming year.

Who is Bill Gates?

Bill Gates also known as William Henry Gates III (Trey – meaning 3) was born in the year 1955, October the 28^th in Seattle WA. His father is William H Gates Senior and his mother is Mary Maxwell Gates.

Gates and his childhood friend Paul Allen (1953-2018) are the founders of the Famous Microsoft Corporation. Since his childhood, Bill was very much interested in computers and technology, pretty much like Elon Musk.

Bill from his childhood was a completely different person, not like the average people, and was often bullied by others kids in his school. His parents always led them to challenging situations and a competitive environment. They wanted the bill to pursue law and become a lawyer, which wasn’t what he wanted.

Bill was enrolled in the Lakeside Prep school when he was just a kid and got a computer from the school. Not only just about learning, but Bill was much interested in learning how the computer works.

Amazingly at an age of 13, he wrote a program called Tic-Tac-Toe which was a computer game. The best thing about that program is that anybody with a computer can play that game.

It was during his school that he met Paul who was 2 years elder than him and both had a good friendship. Both of them were so much passionate about computers and programming, they spend most of their time in labs and ignored their studies.

Later they created software programs that helped in the schooling timetable and also helping software that controls traffic. Bill In Fact is the youngest Billionaire in the world at an age of 31 in 1987, with a Net worth of $1.25 Billion.

Bill Gates Family Biography:

When Bill was just 7 years old, he and his family lived in a place called Saint-Point in Seattle. He had two sisters and he was small for his age, which makes other kids bully him. Bill got married in the year 1994 to Melinda (Ex) and has three children. So, here’s the family of Bill Gates;

Bill Gates Sr. - 1925-2020 (Father):

Bill Gates Sr. Also known as William Henry Gates 2 was born in the year 1925, on November the 30^th) in a place called Bremerton, WA. Gates Sr. died in the year 2020 due to Alzheimer's disease, at an age of 94 in Hood Canal WA. William Gates was a great philanthropist, civic leader, attorney, and also served in the United States Army during the 2nd world war for 3 years.

He also served in Seattle King County as president and also founded Shidler McBroom law firm. He married Mary Maxwell in the year 1951 and again married Mimi Gardner in 1996 after Mary died.

Mary Maxwell Gates - 1929-1994 (Mother):

Mary Maxwell Gates (Ann Maxwell) was born in the year 1929, July the 5^th in Seattle WA, was married to Bill Gates Sr. in 1951. Mary was a very successful businesswoman, civic activist, executive, and school teacher.

Mary Gates had also served as a board member to many big corporations such as Unigard Security Insurance Group, First Interstate Bank, and Pacific Northwest Bell. She had also helped her son Bill on various occasions concerning Microsoft. Mary and Bill Gates Sr. had three children, two daughters and a son (Bill).

Kristi Gates (Elder Sister):

Kristi Gates also known as Kristianne Gates (Blake) was born in the year 1954, January the 1^st is the elder sister of Bill Gates. She is specialized in Personal Financing and tax planning as a CPA. Kristi is also serving as a board member in several big corporations like Advantage IQ, Laird Norton Tyee, and Avista Corporation.

Libby Gates Macphee (Younger Sister):

Libby Gates Macphee also known as Libley Gates was born in the year 1957 is the younger sister of Bill. She has served for more than 20 years in the governance role of several educational institutions. Libby is also serving as a board member in the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and Seattle Children’s Hospital.

Melinda Gates Ex-Wife (M 1994 – D 2021):

Melinda Gates (Melinda Ann French) was born on the year 1964, August 14^th in Dallas TX to Raymond Joseph & Elaine Amerland. She was a topper in her school and graduated in 1982 from Ursuline Academy of Dallas.

Melinda also earned a bachelor's degree in CS, computer science, and in 1986 (economics from Duke University) and MBA (Duke's Fuqua School of Business) in the year 1987. Melinda Gates is recognized and listed by Forbes Magazine as one of the most powerful women in the world.

Bill and Melinda met at a trade fair in New York in 1987 and the couple after dating 7 years, finally married in 1994. The couple had 3 children: Jennifer, Phoebe, and Rory Gates.

After a long 27 years of being together as a couple, Bill Gates and Melinda announced their divorce in 2021, May. She is one of the most well-known women Philanthropists who is still actively involved in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Jennifer Katharine Gates (Daughter):

Jennifer Katharine Gates was born in the year 1996, April the 26^th in Bellevue WA, and is the eldest daughter of Bill Gates. She had attended Stanford University and graduated from NY University in 2013.

Jennifer Gates is a person who really loves adventures and is an American show jumper, equestrian, and horse rider. She is engaged to Nayel Nassar in 2020, (January) who is also an Egyptian Show Jumper.

Despite the fact that her father is one of the richest men on the planet, she will inherit a very small portion of her father’s wealth. Bill Gates wants his kids to find their own way and amazingly with all the hard works Jennifer Katharine Gates Net worth is $20 Million now.

Rory John Gates (Son):

Rory Gates is the only son of Bill Gates, was born in the year 1999, 23rth May in Seattle WA. He did his schooling in Lakeside school where his father started his career.

Rory also studied at Duke University and earned a degree in economics and computer science. He is also an MBA degree holder from Fuqua School of Business. Neither Rory nor any of his sisters will be inheriting their parents' wealth and hence they are all brought up with great values.

Phoebe Adele Gates (Daughter):

Phoebe Gates is the youngest daughter of Bill & Melinda Gates was born in the year 2002, Sept 14 in Seattle WA. Phoebe is just like her father who loves computers and loves singing and dancing.

Phoebe had also attended American Ballet art classes, Lincoln Centre for the performing arts in NY, and also Julliard School. She is also expected to complete her graduation in the year 2021 and loves reading just like her father.

Bill Gates Early Education & Career:

Did you know that Gates who is one of the richest men on the planet is also a college dropped out? Bill started his early schooling with Lakeside Prep school in the year 1968 and he was good in Maths.

Gates Education:

It was when he was in the 8^th Grade the school bought computers which is a Teletype Model 33 (ASR terminal) for students. After this Bill Gates & Paul Allen became passionate about computers and then started writing many programs for the school.

Bill along with Paul, Ric Weiland, & Kent Evans was banned by Computer Centre Corporation (CCC) after they exploit bugs to obtain free computer time. Later they formed a club called Lakeside computer Programmers with a goal to make money.

After they were released from the ban by CCC, Gates started to study different source codes like machine language, FORTRAN & Lisp. Later that year, Bill and Evan Created Class Monitoring software for their school, also they get remuneration for their work.

Later in a sad accident that happened in a mountain climbing accident, Evans was killed. After this incident, Bill Gates team up with Paul Allen on most of the new projects.

In February 1973, Gates was enrolled in the Famous Harvard University, after his graduation from Lakewood school. He was a National Merit scholar and his core was 1590 out of 1600 SAT.

In Harvard Gates was planning to study Pre-law which was influenced by his parents. But Bill gates is a man addicted to computer programming and technology, hence he dropped out in the first year.

Gates Career:

In the year 1972 Gates team up with Paul Allen & Paul Gilbert and created software to help the road traffic. The same year Bill Gates also worked in the House of Representatives, as a congressional page.

In May 1975 Bill was assigned a job from the company called Altair Star. This is where Bill Gates and Paul Allen started Microsoft and later in the year 1976 the company registers Microsoft Trademark.

In 1977 Gates left his study to set up Microsoft in Albuquerque NM and 1988 was the year when Microsoft hits $1 Million in sales. 1981 – Microsoft Corporation launches the MS-Dos system, after buying it from a company called Seattle Computers.

Later they provide their license to the company called International Business Machines Corporation (IBM). Unfortunately in 1983, Paul Allen was forced to leave Microsoft after suffering from Hodgkin’s disease, later found to be cancer. On the other hand, Bill announces the New Program called Microsoft Windows as an Extension to MS-DOS. At an age of 31, Bill Gates became a billionaire.

Microsoft & Bill Gates– A Brief History:

Microsoft is the single most powerful software ever invented that has dominated the world of computers. The founder Bill Gates and Paul Allen were genius computer programming fanatics since they were a child.

If you have used a computer, Laptop, played video games, you have already used a Microsoft product. Almost 70-80% of the computers in the world have Microsoft O.S.

No matter how big the company is today, it started with very humble beginnings with few teenage kids. In the year 1968, the four Teenagers Bill, Allen, Ric & Kent, in Lakeside School found their passion with the school computers.

One of the computers in school was Teletype Model 33 and they wanted to explore more with the computers. They even made a video game app called Tic TAC Toe and Class Monitoring software.

At that time, renting a computer was very expensive as it can cost anywhere up to $40 an hour. So, they wanted to go the wrong way by exploiting some bugs and use these computers for free.

Later the company CCC caught them stealing the usage time and they temporarily banned all four of them for 6 months. After this incident they formed the CPC, Computer programmers club in Seattle, helping companies fix unwanted bugs.

And surprisingly after the ban time was over, the four programmers got CCC as their first customer. After this Bill Gates and Paul Allen made another program called Traf-o-Data which converts road traffic into easily readable reports.

It was in the year 1975; a popular electronics (A Magazine) featured a company called Altair 8800 which was a microcomputer. Paul found this news and later suggested this to Bill Gates, as this was the first successful commercial computer.

MITS Altair:

After Bill and Paul discussed this and planned to make a basic programming language interpreter for this computer. And they contacted the inventors of Altair computers who were Micro Instrumentation & Telemetry Systems (MITS).

The company shows interest in having the interpreter, so Bill Gates & Paul Allen started working on it. So, after delivering the interpreter programming with much difficulty, MITs agreed to sell their program, as Altair Basic.

So, this becomes the first successful software created by their company called Micro Computer software, known as Microsoft today. This is what makes Bill Gates & Allen the owner of a Multi-Million dollar company.

In the year 1980, the revenue of Microsoft Corporation was rising to a whopping $30 Million. After this huge success, Gates and Allen started to tie up with the famous company IBM. They made a proposal for making their software to be used in the upcoming personal computers of IBM.

At the same time, the operating system of Bill and Paul wasn’t completely. Ready. So they decided to buy out an OS (86 DOS) from a company called Seattle Computer by Rod Brock for $75,000 with an agreement to pay a royalty.

IBM & Microsoft:

The OS bought by Bill & Paul from Rod Brock was re-named by Microsoft as MS-DOS. In the year 1981, the giant company IBM launch their Personal computer model, which became super popular all over the world.

This further leads to the rise of Microsoft products as the most popular computer programs, as IBM was using MS-DOS as their primary OS. Not only to IBM but Microsoft has already licensed MS-DOS to more than 70 other companies including Compaq.

Apple & Microsoft:

At that time, the majority of all the personal computers in the world uses Microsoft operating system except Apple Computers. Later Microsoft started working on many other projects to develop MS Word, Excel, and Windows.

In the year 1983 Apple Inc was the only big company that had a GUI (graphical user interface) for the computers. So after few years, Microsoft develops Windows 1.0 to compete with Apple products.

In March 1986, Microsoft has its first IPO (Initial Public Offering) listed on the stock exchange. The company was valued at $350 Million with a total number of 2,795,000 shares.

After a few years, Gates and his team acquired PowerPoint from a company called Forethought. This makes a complete package of Microsoft office and Bill Gates with his team became some of the richest people on the planet.

How Bill Gates Saved Apple Inc?

In the 1980s, 90s Apple Inc was considered as one of the biggest business rivalries of Microsoft. In today’s date, Apple is the biggest and the most powerful company in the world, with its share price skyrocket in the stock market. It is also the first company to hit the trillion-dollar mark.

In the 90s, Apple Inc was selling computers since it was Apple computers. The products that the company was selling were extremely expensive and they also refused to license their software.

Back in those days, most computers were used for official purposes and the main thing is the software for them. So, most companies automatically preferred Microsoft and thus leading it to the decline of Apple.

After a few years, in the year 1997, Bill Gates and Microsoft already had 90% of the market share. And windows from Microsoft were the main preferred software in all computers.

This is the year when Apple was on the verge of collapse as everything inside and outside of the company was a mess. In the month of July that year, the company was left with just 3 months of cash.

It was in the year 1997, 6^th August; Steve Jobs surprised the world by making an announcement that Bill Gates had invested $150 Million in Apple. It was announced that Microsoft who was the biggest rival made a partnership with Apple Inc, through Bill Gates.

Apple decided to make the internet explorer the default browser in the Macintosh. The money Gates invested bought shares from Apple as Non- Voting shares. Microsoft also was installed on Macintosh for 5 years.

Why Bill Gates Saved Apple Inc?

This in fact saved Apple from bankruptcy and Bill Gates did it for many reasons as he was a businessman. In those years Bill was under the monitoring of anti-trust regulators and politicians.

The US department of justice was planning to take action against Gates since the year 1993. By saving Apple, Microsoft has not only done well for Apple but also saved Microsoft itself from legal actions.

After the Department of Justice settled with Bill Gates and Microsoft, gates converted his Apple shares into regular stocks. These resulted in a whopping 18 Million Apple shares for Mr. Gates which he again sold in 2003.

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF):

The BMGF, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation was formed in the year 2000 after merging the Gates learning and William H Gates Foundation. It is by far the largest charitable foundation in the world, which is focused on education healthcare, and fighting poverty all over the world.

In the year 1994, Bill Gates Father, William H Gates realized that there were several requests from many organizations for charitable donations. That is the time Bill’s father launched the William H Gates Foundation to help fight poverty all over the world.

As Microsoft grows and became one of the most profitable businesses with a staggering Net Worth, Bill & Melinda also were becoming aware of the poverty in third-world countries. So finally Bill & Melinda decided to step in and that’s how BMGF was formed.

In the year 1997, the Gates Library Foundation was also launched with a goal to provide internet access to all public libraries in the US. After that, the Gates Millennium Scholars Program (GMS) was also launched in the year 1999 with $1.6 Billion funded by a grant from BMGF.

So, all of these foundations were merged together in the year 2000 and formed the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. With a financial endowment of close to $50 Billion in the year 2020, the foundation has helped millions of poor people across the globe.

One of the biggest contributors to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is Bill’s best friend Warren Buffet. In the year 2006 Buffett donated 10 Million Berkshire Hathaway shares and also half of his wealth to the foundation. The main individuals of the Gates Foundation are Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, Michael Larson, Mark Suzman (CEO), and Billionaire Warren Buffett.

Rewards & Recognition of Bill Gates:

Over the years the Gates family has done numerous contributions to the welfare of humanity across the globe. Such works are always recognized and appreciated by everyone, especially in countries where the majority of the population is economically poor. Some of the rewards and recognition of Bill Gates over the years are;

2001:

Bill Gates was listed as the Top 100 Most Influential People in Media by The Guardian Newspaper, UK

2002:

The Jefferson Award for public service, US recognized Bill & Melinda Gates for their charitable services benefiting the poor and the disadvantaged.

2003:

The Nyenrode Business University in the Netherlands awarded Bill Gates with Honorary Doctorates.

2004:

The Time Magazine, NY City listed Gates as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20^th century.

2005:

Bill Gates was honored by Queen Elizabeth II as the Knight Commander of the order (British Empire).

2006:

The president of Portugal honored Gates with the Grand Cross of the order (Prince Henry). Bill also won several other humanitarian awards the same year.

2007:

Bill receives another honorary doctorate from Karolinska Institute Sweden and Harvard University too.

2010:

The Franklin Institute Pennsylvania awarded Bill Gates the Bower Awards for Business leadership for his Philanthropic works.

2011-12:

Bill Gates was ranked the 5^th most powerful person in the world (2011) and the 4^th in 2012 by Forbes.

2015:

Bill and Melinda Gates were awarded the Padma Bhusan award by the Indian government for their Philanthropic works in the country.

2016:

The US president Barack Obama awarded Bill & Melinda Gates with the Presidential Medal of Freedom for their service to humanity. The same year the president of France Francois Hollande awarded Bill and Melinda Gates with the commander of the Legion (Honour).

10 Facts About Bill Gates That You Didn’t Know: