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The guy did not hold his appointment when they came to see him. He went flying his cessna or something frivolous like that. When IBM asked for another referral from Gates, he decided this might be something worth looking into.
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To the best of my knowledge, it was because Gary Kildall (head of Digital Research, formerly Intergalatic Digital Research) wouldn't sign a non-disclosure agreement with IBM saying he wouldn't repeat what they discussed in the meeting. IBM goes back to Gates, Gates buys a crummy obscure OS called QDOS ridiculously cheap, and turns it into an empire.
Don't get me wrong, he's a fantastic businessman, but man - talk about right place, right time. And for anyone who thinks that Gates was some kind of genius hardcore supercoder,
this is an amusing story on that topic.