The Channel Wire

November 29, 2007

Bill Gates and Paul Allen once got their kicks in a brick office building located just off Route 66 in eastern Albuquerque, across the street from the New Mexico State Fairgrounds. Now any company able to pay $83,000 for 1200 square feet of office space with two rest rooms can set up shop in the building where Microsoft was born.

The Albuquerque office building where Gates and Allen founded Microsoft and operated the company from 1975 to 1979 currently has three available office units, which are being listed by Maestas & Ward, a local commercial real estate firm.

In his June commencement speech to Harvard University graduates, Gates mentioned the office building's important role in Microsoft's history.

In January 1975, Gates called MITS (Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems), the company that was developing the world's first PCs, offering to sell them software.

MITS, which occupied the building at the time, told Gates to come back in a month. During that time, Gates and Allen wrote the first version of Microsoft BASIC, and then moved to Albuquerque and set up shop in the building.

Today, the surrounding neighborhood, which has been "a little downtrodden" in recent years, is on the rebound, due in part to its proximity to the University Of New Mexico and Nob Hill district of the city, according to a representative from Maestas & Ward.

Paul Allen bought the building four years ago with the intent of using it as the site of a Microsoft history museum, but later scrapped the plan and sold the building. However, Microsoft recently placed a plaque outside the building that acknowledges the historical significance of the site in the annals of IT industry history.