Why IBM Turned to Microsoft for BASIC

There is a widespread opinion that Microsoft’s lucrative 1980 contract with IBM must have involved some kind of foul play. After all, it is hard to believe that the computing mammoth like IBM needed a tiny company such as Microsoft to provide system software for its planned entry-level computer. As usual, to make an informed conclusion, some wider context is necessary…Microsoft’s Monopoly on BASIC InterpretersThe critical thing to understand is that Microsoft was a monopoly even before IBM approached it. The market it dominated was small: BASIC interpreters for personal computers, but it was a monopoly, nevertheless. Microsoft’s core product, the BASIC interpreter, ran on almost all popular personal computers at the time1, including various TRS models, the Commodore PET, Atari machines, and the Apple II.The only theoretical alternative was Tiny Basic - a public domain interpreter developed in 1975 as a reaction to Microsoft BASIC which was considered too expensive. Tandy used Tiny…