New Delhi: The 50-year anniversary of Microsoft happened on April 4, 2025. Leaders and employees of Microsoft joined together with longtime fans in the company’s headquarters at Redmond Washington to mark the 50th anniversary celebrations. Considering Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft with his partner in 1975 he posted nostalgic reflections about his memories on both his social media platforms and his personal website.
Bill Gates gets nostalgic on Instagram
To mark the occasion, Gates posted a fun reel on Instagram that mixed old memories with a bit of humor. The video started with a present-day selfie of him sitting on a couch, then shifted to throwback pictures from Microsoft’s early days. He captioned it, “Happy 50th birthday, @microsoft. Thanks for the memories, and awkward photo shoots.” One part of the video read, “Unfortunately I’ll never feel cool again because this was me in the early Microsoft days.” The post was a hit, getting around 80,000 likes.
A special but bittersweet moment
In a blog post on Gates Notes, Bill Gates called the anniversary a bittersweet moment. He shared memories of starting Microsoft with Paul Allen while they were still students, working late nights at Harvard’s computer lab. “It feels like just yesterday that Paul and I were hunched over the PDP-10 writing code,” he wrote. Their dream was to put “a computer on every desk and in every home” something that seemed far-fetched at the time but has become a reality.
Sharing the “Coolest Code”
Gates also revealed what he called “the coolest code” he ever wrote, the software that kicked off Microsoft’s journey. He traced the company’s beginning back to January 1975, when Popular Electronics magazine featured the Altair 8800, an early personal computer kit. Gates and Allen instantly saw its potential and decided to build software for it. At the time, personal computers were almost unheard of, but their vision helped shape the future of tech.
Gates did not forget to acknowledge the numerous individuals who contributed to Microsoft becoming the giant that it is today. He expressed his appreciation for leaders such as Steve Ballmer and current CEO Satya Nadella, and for the long hours put in by teams throughout the company. He attributed Microsoft’s success to always being about great team work and good leadership.
Microsoft has consistently been all about making life simpler and work more efficient.
