Bill Gates quit Microsoft Board amid probe into an affair with a female employee dailymail.co.uk

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Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates had an ‘inappropriate’ sexual relationship with a female employee in 2000, and resigned while the relationship was being investigated by the company board, the Wall Street Journal is reporting. 

The affair came to light after the Microsoft employee wrote to the board in 2019 detailing the affair – and allegedly asked that Gates’ estranged wife Melinda Gates, 56, read the letter.

Members of the board tasked with the matter hired a law firm to investigate the allegation by the Microsoft engineer in a letter she wrote stating that she had a sexual relationship over years with Bill Gates.

Gates, 65, suddenly resigned in March 2020 while the investigation was still underway.

The Microsoft board decided that Gates should step down after the relationship was deemed to be ‘inappropriate’, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The same day Gates quit Microsoft he also announced he was stepping down from his position with the board of Berkshire Hathaway, run by his friend Warren Buffet.

In a press release the tech mogul said he would continue to serve as a technical adviser to Chief Executive Satya Nadella.

“Microsoft received a concern in the latter half of 2019 that Bill Gates sought to initiate an intimate relationship with a company employee in the year 2000,” a Microsoft spokesman said. “A committee of the Board reviewed the concern, aided by an outside law firm to conduct a thorough investigation. Throughout the investigation, Microsoft provided extensive support to the employee who raised the concern.”

The New York Times reported two instances where the tech mogul clumsily asked out women who worked for him at Microsoft and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The two incidents and other more recent ones at times created an uncomfortable workplace environment, with Gates’ personal life becoming gossip fodder among employees, six current and former staffers told the newspaper.

It is unclear how much Melinda knew about her husband’s behavior.

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