A Missed Chance: How Apple and Microsoft's Paths Diverged

In 1985, a young Bill Gates, known for his work on the Mac, sent a memo to Apple's top bosses. He suggested that Apple should let other companies use its Mac operating system. This idea was not well received by Apple's leaders, John Sculley and Jean Louis Gassée. They believed that the Mac was too good to share. Gates thought that Apple needed to make the Mac a standard in the computer world. He believed that Apple couldn't do this alone. He suggested that Apple should allow three to five big companies, like AT&T and Motorola, to make their own versions of the Mac. Gates even offered to help Apple with this plan. Sculley was interested in the idea, but Gassée was not. He thought the Mac was too advanced and that Apple should stick to selling its own computers. Apple decided not to follow Gates' advice. Instead, they made a deal with Microsoft that allowed Microsoft to use some of the Mac's design in its own software. This deal seemed harmless at first. Windows 1. 0 was not a big threat to the Mac. But things changed when Windows 2. 0 came out in 1987. Apple sued Microsoft, saying they had copied the Mac's design. The court ruled in Microsoft's favor, saying the original deal covered the design elements in question. This set the stage for the 1990s. Microsoft went on to dominate the computer world with Windows 95, while Apple struggled and almost went bankrupt. It's ironic that Apple later tried to license its operating system to other companies, but it didn't help. It took Steve Jobs' return to Apple to turn things around. Today, Apple and Microsoft are both among the world's most valuable companies. It's interesting to think about how things might have been different if Apple had taken Gates' advice back in 1985. But in the end, both companies found their own paths to success.