Bill Gates once dragged his rival software boss to traffic court instead of a business meeting
An excerpt from a biography reveals that a young Bill Gates once brought his business rival, Seymour Rubinstein, to traffic court to help him resolve legal issues stemming from his reckless driving. Despite being competitors in the software industry, the two maintained a professional relationship that included Rubinstein offering legal advice.
Why it matters
This anecdote provides a humanizing look at the early days of the tech industry and the unconventional relationships between its founding figures.
Before he was one of the richest men alive, Bill Gates had a speeding habit that kept landing him in trouble. The Microsoft co-founder loved fast Porsches, drove them hard, and collected enough tickets that traffic cops became a regular fixture of his early years. At one point his driving record got bad enough to put his license—and reportedly his freedom—on the line.So Gates did something unusual. When Seymour Rubinstein, one of Microsoft's biggest competitors, showed up expecting a business meeting, Gates told him the meeting was moving to traffic court. Rubinstein, the founder of MicroPro and the man behind the hugely popular WordStar, ended up coaching his young rival on how to avoid jail time and keep his license.The speeding habit that Bill Gates' radar detector couldn't fixGates's love of speed went back to Microsoft's earliest days. He owned a green Porsche 911 and pushed it constantly.
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