Well he had the “brain cells” to “out market” several technically superior operating systems (for example OS/2, Apple!) & other office software. So I give him that anything else not so much!
The more I find out about Gates and his family connections, the more convinced I am that he was a front man. IBM owned the computer world. Another entity wanted it. They had shark lawyers that knew how to screw someone out of an operating system, and figured out that granting a non-exclusive license to IBM to use the system would allow them to undercut IBM on different computers.
They got this geeky kid to be the face of the company, and sent him in to the meetings. IBM wouldn't realize they were dealing with a multi-billion dollar organization looking to screw them, they'd think they were dealing with this geeky college dropout and his buds, who happened to be good at computing.
TL;DR: I don't believe any of the Gates back story. From the beginning, MS had big brains and sharks involved. Gates was the front man, and he still is. Most of the rags to riches stories are made up.
Ever notice how Walmart got big when Hillary Clinton was on the board?
Just like Our President said the other day to a jackass reporter: Just because Bite Me said something nice about me doesn’t mean HE did it, he has people to do things like that;
Case in point: Gates has people around him to do things like that, HE doesn’t have the brain cells to do that or anything else...