It has been reported that IBM made a deal with Microsoft in part because the chairman of IBM was friends with Bill Gates’s mother. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08

It has been reported that IBM made a deal with Microsoft in part because the chairman of IBM was friends with Bill Gates’s mother. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/05/how-bill-gates-mother-influenced-the-success-of-microsoft.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/05/how-bill-gates-mother-influe... It is likely that no other company could’ve gotten the same deal.