Since the 1990s, it has increasingly diversified from the operating system market and has made a number of corporate acquisitions, their largest being the acquisition of LinkedIn for $26.2 billion in December 2016, followed by their acquisition of Skype Technologies for $8.5 billion in May 2011. The company's 1986 initial public offering (IPO), and subsequent rise in its share price, created three billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires among Microsoft employees. It rose to dominate the personal computer operating system market with MS-DOS in the mid-1980s, followed by Windows. Microsoft was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen on April 4, 1975, to develop and sell BASIC interpreters for the Altair 8800. It is one of the Big Five American information technology companies, alongside Google, Amazon, Apple, and Meta.

21 in the 2020 Fortune 500 rankings of the largest United States corporations by total revenue it was the world's largest software maker by revenue as of 2019. Its flagship hardware products are the Xbox video game consoles and the Microsoft Surface lineup of touchscreen personal computers. Its best-known software products are the Windows line of operating systems, the Microsoft Office suite, and the Internet Explorer and Edge web browsers.

Gigaom reports that the Tencent-owned company has over 200 million users.Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation which produces computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washington, United States. MSN Messenger and Skype have seen increased competition in China following the rise of rival messaging platform QQ. 31, Microsoft is offering all Chinese users of the service a $2 Skype coupon to ease the transition.

Now that MSN Messenger will officially close on Oct. Microsoft's joint venture in China came to an end last year, after a dispute between Skype and a TOM Group spokesman over the number of new users acquired by Skype in China during its nine-year history in the country. The partnership had been heavily criticized for developing modified versions of Microsoft software to comply with Chinese internet regulations. MSN Messenger remained active in China thanks to a troubled partnership with Chinese media company TOM group. Many a friendship and romance blossomed and died via Messenger's odd blue/green color scheme. Before the mobile phone, Messenger was texting. For a time, MSN Messenger was the instant message platform of choice and its death will prompt a quiet wave of tech nostalgia.

Msn news skype