Paul Allen

Paul Gardner Allen (born January 21, 1953 in Seattle, Washington) is an American entrepreneur who co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates. Allen regularly appears on lists of the richest people in the world; as of 2007 Forbes ranks him the fifth richest American[1], worth an estimated $18.0 billion. He is the founder and chairman of Vulcan Inc. (his private asset management company) and chairman of Charter Communications. Allen also has a multibillion dollar investment portfolio which includes large stakes in DreamWorks Animation SKG, Digeo, real estate holdings and more than 40 other technology, media and content companies.

Allen was recently invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS).

Allen also owns twelve professional sports teams including the Seattle Seahawks of the National Football League, the Portland Trail Blazers of the National Basketball Association, and the future Seattle soccer franchise in Major League Soccer that will begin playing in the 2009 season.

In 2007, Allen was listed among Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in The World.

He currently resides in Mercer Island, Washington

With Bill Gates, he co-founded Microsoft (initially "Micro-Soft") in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1975, and began selling a BASIC programming language interpreter. In 1980, Allen spearheaded a deal for Microsoft to buy an operating system called 86-DOS (QDOS) for $50,000. Due to IBM deadlines, Gates and Allen felt that they didn't have enough time to develop an operating system from scratch; they therefore purchased the fully functional QDOS and reworked the code to fit IBM's needs. Microsoft won a contract to supply the finished program for use as the operating system of IBM's new PC. This became a foundation of Microsoft's growth.

In 1983 Allen was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease. Before resigning from Microsoft to pursue medical treatment, it is alleged that Allen overheard a discussion between Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer regarding Allen's health and talking about how to get Allen's shares back if he were to die.[2] Allen himself has neither confirmed nor denied this allegation and there is no recorded evidence of the discussion. Allen's cancer was successfully treated by several months of radiation therapy and a bone marrow transplant. However, Allen did not return to Microsoft and began distancing himself from the company.

In November 2000, Allen resigned from his position on the Microsoft board but was asked to consult as a senior strategy advisor to the company's executives. He further distanced himself from Microsoft by selling 68 million shares. He still owns a reported 138 million shares.