Microsoft
Microsoft Buys Full Rights to 86-DOS
July 27, 1981
About two weeks before IBM begins shipping the first IBM PC, Microsoft buys the full rights to the operating system 86-DOS, formerly known as QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System), from Seattle Computer Products for $50,000. Microsoft had previously paid $25,000 to SCP for a non-exclusive license in December 1980 in order to begin porting the operating system to the IBM PC, which used the Intel 8088 processor. Microsoft renamed 86-DOS to MS-DOS and licensed it to IBM as PC-DOS. SCP would later sue Microsoft claiming fraud because Microsoft did not reveal IBM as a licensee. The case was settled in SCP’s favor for 1 million dollars, a fraction of the annual revenue Microsoft was receiving from MS-DOS and PC-DOS.
The Unholy Alliance is Born
July 22, 1980
Representatives from an IBM facility in Boca Raton, Florida, where a small group of engineers were secretly developing the IBM PC, meet with Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer of Microsoft to discuss licensing software and an operating system for the still-developing PC. Not having an operating system to offer IBM, Microsoft will eventually buy the rights to QDOS/86-DOS from Seattle Computing Products, which they in-turn license to IBM as PC-DOS, and later license to PC clone makers as MS-DOS. This alliance between IBM and Microsoft forms one of the most dominant platforms in the history of computing, which goes on to crush nearly all other PC platforms in the 80’s and 90’s. Ironically this platform nearly crushes IBM itself as they lost control of the platform to PC clone makers and Microsoft.