Bill Gates, who co-founded Microsoft, and his wife Melinda, are divorcing after 27 years of marriage.
The couple, who co-chair the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a global health and development charity, announced their split on Twitter, saying they would continue to work together at the foundation.
The couple both posted the statement announcing their divorce on Twitter.
The statement reads:
“After a great deal of thought and a lot of work on our relationship, we have made the decision to end our marriage,” they said in a joint statement posted by each on their Twitter feed. “Over the last 27 years, we have raised three incredible children and built a foundation that works over the world to enable all people to lead healthy, productive lives. We continue to share a belief in that mission and will continue our work together at the foundation, but we no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in this next phase of our lives. We ask for space and privacy for our family as we begin to navigate this new life.”
How did Bill Gates and Melinda meet?
The couple met in 1987 after Melinda became a product manager at Microsoft and were seated next to each other at a business dinner in New York City. They were married in 1994 in Hawaii.
In a 2019 Netflix documentary entitled “Inside Bill’s Brain,” Melinda laughed about the memory of finding a whiteboard in Bill’s bedroom that listed “the pros and the cons of getting married,” CNBC reported.
Bill Gates was Microsoft’s CEO until 2000 and since then has gradually scaled back his involvement in the company he started with Paul Allen in 1975. He transitioned out of a day-to-day role in Microsoft in 2008 and served as chairman of the board until 2014.
Bill Gates, 65, is No. 4 on The Forbes Billionaires list. with $124 billion, behind Jeff Bezos ($177 billion), Elon Musk ($157 billion), Bernard Arnault & Family ($150 billion)… and ahead of Mark Zuckerberg ($97 billion).
