Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Examining PC-DOS before its general release with the IBM PC, Kildall concluded that
the operating system infringed on many aspects of his CP/M. After Kildall threatened IBM
with legal action, IBM told Kildall they would offer CP/M-86 as an option for the PC in
return for a release of liability. Kildall accepted.
Thus, when the IBM PC was first introduced as IBM Model Number 5150 on August
12, 1981, IBM sold its operating system as an unbundled option. For the first few months
of PC sales, however, customers had only PC-DOS ($40) from which to choose. Kildall did
not get his CP/M-86 out the door until several months later, and then priced it at $240. So
ended the life of CP/M; and so began the meteoric rise of Microsoft, now based in Seattle.
The episode would lead
Business Week
, looking back in 2004, to call Kildall "the man who
could have been Bill Gates."
Kildall eventually sold his company to Novell and became rich. He remained with the
firm for a while but, as notes Michael Swaine: "At Novell, all traces of DRI products and
projects quickly dissolved and were absorbed like sutures on a healing wound." After leav-
ing Novell, Kildall "did charitable work in the area of pediatric AIDS. It should have been
a good life, but all was not sublime. His second marriage was ending in divorce, and there
were signs that lack of credit [for his role in the start of the PC revolution] was continuing
to eat at him." He died in 1994 at the age of 52.
