Business Case Studies, Leadership Case Study, Tata Group,Ratan Tata

Code :LDS0017B

Year : 2006

Industry :Information Technology and IT Enabled Services

Region : USA

Teaching Note:Not Available

Structured Assignment :Not Available

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Introduction: In 1968, the Lakeside preparatory school decided to acquaint the students with computers. As computers were expensive for the school to purchase on its own, the school rented computers from General Electric2. In the same year, Gates, Paul Allen, and a few other Lakeside students (many of whom were the first programmers hired by Microsoft) fascinated with the machines, formed the Lakeside Programmers Group. They skipped classes and stayed in the computer room all day and night, writing programs and reading computer literature.

In 1968, a deal between Lakeside Prep School and the Computer Center Corporation3 allowed the school to continue providing extra computer time for its students. This provided an opportunity for Gates and his friends to work on computers for more time. Gates and his comrades, in order to learn more, started altering files and broke the computer’s security system which caused the system to crash several times. When the Computer Center Corporation faced security problems, it decided to hire Gates and his team to find the bugs and expose the weaknesses in its computer system. In return the Computer Center Corporation gave Bill Gates and his associates unlimited computer time which helped them to develop their talents further. Gates said, "It was when we got free time at C-cubed (Computer Center Corporation) that we really got into computers. I mean, then I became hardcore. It was day and night"