Bill Gates leaving Microsoft is a common belief, but his opinion is still sought years later, when a major change is about to happen at Microsoft. Back in 2017, Gates shared a memo with the top management of the company in which he predicted that a new world order was coming and said that we would have personal digital agents, which he called AI agents, that would foresee all our desires and needs.
Bill G’s predictions
Gates predicted that these agents would be godlike and another breed than what Siri and Alexa are. He wrote that the agents will do more than just change the way we interact with computers; he explained with an example of how we transitioned from writing commands to clicking on icons, and after that time, it will be a much bigger change that will disrupt the software industry.
The idea presented in the memo seemed too futuristic, said a Microsoft executive under the conditions of anonymity, according to Business Insider, as it was considered outlandish by most. Who knew Microsoft would be working on these agents in the coming years and developing some of the best? The artificial intelligence tool of Microsoft called Copilot, which made it the world’s most valuable company, was perceived through the secret communication of Bill Gates.
The source told the media outlet that Copilot now seems exactly what Gates mentioned, as it is capable of making presentations and performing many other tasks such as summarizing meetings or long texts and is based on a large language model (LLM) of OpenAI. Copilot was released last year for Windows 11, but it also works on a select few devices operating on Windows 10, but with limited functionality.
Bill Gates still plays behind the curtains
Satya Nadella now leads the $3 trillion-dollar tech behemoth, but Gates is still the one who is the real mastermind behind the veil, despite the fact that he has been out of sight since 2021 after some allegations.
It is believed that he is the one who is behind Microsoft’s relations with OpenAI, especially its CEO, Sam Altman, and also behind the integration of ChatGPT-like tech into search engine Bing that challenged Google. Business Insider also referenced an unknown executive who said that Gates is involved in all important decisions and company operations as he advises on high-level recruiting, products, and strategies.
The news outlet also reported that CEO Satya Nadella and all the senior management sought Gates’s advice on every important issue. Gates retired as the Microsoft board’s chair back in 2020, and at that time, Nadella complimented him with high praise and said that,
“[The company will] continue to benefit from Bill’s ongoing technical passion and advice to drive our products and services forward.”
Source: Business Insider.
Till today, the co-founder is said to be advising Microsoft on product strategies, as he spends ten percent of his time in Washington at Redmond. Looking at all this, it does not seem like Gates has been distant since he left the board. He seems present everywhere, as history tells us, there has never been a visionary who commanded an age and then another, but Bill G seems to be making history, and he seems to be winning which is clear by the fortunes his company is making and the success it got with the tech of the new era that is none other than AI.
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