Love him or hate him, Bill Gates has been one of the most important men in the technological age of the past thirty years. Without him, and Microsoft, the company he founded with Paul Allen in 1975, the world would be a very different place today, and personal computing may never have become the mainstream force for change it now is.

So his retirement from the day to day running of Microsoft is big news, and the end of an important era. Gates had already reduced his workload quite substantially before yesterday, but the 27th June 2008 is the day he finally left to start a new, potentially more peaceful life.

Gates has spent the last six months on a long farewell tour, starting with a keynote speech at the CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in Las Vegas in January. That tour came to an end yesterday when Microsoft held a town hall meeting in Redmond to say goodbye.

Gates has now left his full-time role as executive at Microsoft, and will now focus his time mainly on the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the philanthropic organization funded by his vast fortune, currently estimated to be around $58 billion.

Gates joined Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on stage at the event (pictured), gave a short farewell speech to 800 of his ex-employees and then answered a few questions. During the two-minute speech, Gates seemed visably choked to be leaving the company he founded more than thirty years ago, but held it together to give us some quotes to remember him by courtesy of Reuters.

There won’t be a day in my life that I’m not thinking about Microsoft and the great things that it’s doing and wanting to help.

I love that kind of thing where people are underestimating Microsoft. Yes, we make mistakes and we know it, but we come back and learn from those things. A lot of our best work is the result of that.

I am sure there will some day next month where I start thinking about software and I will start driving here to Microsoft, go up to the fifth floor and walk down to my office and they will be remodelling it.

Gates left to a standing ovation, and I’m sure a tear in his eye. Gates will still be involved with the company in a small way, becoming part-time non-executive chairman, but for all intents and purposes, the Gates era is over. Which anyone who hates Vista will tell you, is maybe no bad thing at this stage of proceedings.

Microsoft will probably carry on in much the same vein with or without the input of chief geek himself Gates. With Windows 7 edging ever nearer, it has a perfect opportunity to get back on track and in favour with its broad consumer base. And Gates won’t have anything to do with it.

Goodbye Mr. Gates, you will be missed by geeks and billionaires everywhere.

Related:

Entry was posted on Saturday, June 28th, 2008 at 1:23 pm under Microsoft, Opinion, Vista.

Read more entries by Dave Parrack.
Stumble It!