Microsoft was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975 and became a trillion-dollar company in 2019.
Microsoft’s market capitalization passed $1 trillion during trading on 25 April 2019 after the company reported strong quarterly results. The result reflected the growing importance of cloud computing, particularly its Azure platform, alongside established businesses such as Windows, Office, and enterprise software.
The company began by developing and licensing software for personal computers. Its agreement to provide an operating system for IBM-compatible PCs helped make MS-DOS and later Windows central to the expansion of the PC industry. Microsoft subsequently broadened into productivity software, gaming, search, hardware, and cloud services.
The $1 trillion milestone is a market-value measure rather than a statement about revenue or cash holdings. Microsoft’s ranking can move above or below other technology companies as share prices change.