Steven Anthony Ballmer was born on March 24, 1956 in Detroit, Michigan. His father, Frederic Henry Ballmer, was the manager of the Ford Motor Company. In respect of his father, Ballmer has been known to drive a Ford to this day. Steve Ballmer, while he was in the well-to-do suburb of Farmington Hills to begin with, lived and attended the International School of Brussels between 1964 and 1967.
Following a heavy emphasis in mathematics and engineering at Lawrence Technological University and Detroit Country Day School, Ballmer excelled in college but never lost his passion for the university game. After considering a focus on law, he earned a degree magna cum laude from Harvard University in 1977 with an A.B. in applied mathematics and economics. In college, Ballmer was the football team manager and wrote for several newspapers. There, he also met fellow student Bill Gates.
In the following years, Tech Billionaire Ballmer managed as an assistant product manager for Procter & Gamble (P&G), where he was in charge of the Duncan Hines “Moist ‘n Easy” cake mix. Bored with corporate life, Ballmer attempted to get two screenplays made into movies in Hollywood. He would later attend Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Career With Microsoft
In 1980, Gates eventually persuaded Ballmer to drop out of Stanford and take a job as Microsoft’s first business manager. He was offered a starting salary of $50,000 with NO EQUITY. Ballmer would not be given equity; instead,, 10% of all profit growth generated while he was in charge. Within a few years, as Microsoft’s profits exploded, this deal became untenable. To solve the problem Ballmer was given and took a 8% ownership in the company.
It made its public debut with a market cap of $780 million in March 1986. At this time, Gates and Paul Allen owned 45 percent of the company, while Steve Ballmer owned 8 percent.
Gates and Ballmer had developed a close relationship over the next two decades, both personally and professionally. He oversaw a host of Microsoft divisions, including the. NET framework.
In 2000, the power shifted from Gates to Ballmer, who was appointed Microsoft’s new CEO. Still, Gates remained board chairman and continued to guide the company’s direction. Almost as a matter of course, some real animosity began to develop between the two for the first time. Opinion is mixed on Ballmer’s style of running Microsoft. His time there was characterized by massive growth; he tripled sales and doubled profits, but the company’s stock had gone nowhere. What’s more, numerous observers say Ballmer was slow to embrace key trends.
Ballmer did, of course, lead Microsoft into some unfamiliar territory, establishing the Xbox division and playing a key role in mainstreaming Skype. But Ballmer missed the boat on that new smartphone trend, famously calling Apple’s iPhone nothing more than a toy. He also squandered billions on ill-fated acquisitions, such as Nokia, and on failed products, such as the Surface. And when Steve Ballmer was named the country’s worst CEO by several publications, he began to feel that heat. In 2013, he finally retired from Microsoft.
Steve Ballmer Net Worth
Most of Steve Ballmer’s net worth comes from his 333.3 million shares of Microsoft stock. That is about 4 percent of the total outstanding shares. Steve is, in fact, the company’s biggest one-person holder. The company’s co-founder, Bill Gates, owns about 1.3 percent of Microsoft. When Microsoft went public in 1986, Steve Ballmer held 8% of the company, Paul Allen 25%, and Bill Gates 45%.
Steve Ballmer Net Worth Milestones
- 1986 (IPO Day) – $85 million
- 1987 – $270 million
- 1995 -$2 billion
- 1997 – $6 billion
- 1999 – $13 billion
- 2008 – $10 billion
- 2014 – $24 billion
- 2017 – $33 billion
- 2018 – $42 billion
- 2019 – $45 billion
- 2020 – $77 billion
- 2021 – $101 billion
- 2022 – $88 billion
- 2023 – $130 billion
- 2024 – $157 billion
- 2026 – $183 billion
