FACTBOX-Facts about Microsoft Corp

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp offered to buy Yahoo Inc, the popular Web portal, for $44.6 billion (22.4 billion pounds) in cash and stock, seeking to join forces against Google Inc in what would be the biggest Internet deal since the Time Warner-AOL merger.

Microsoft offered to buy Yahoo for $31 per share, a 62 percent premium over Yahoo's previous closing stock price.

The following are some key facts about Microsoft:

* 1968: Eighth-grader William "Bill" Gates first introduced to computers and programming languages.

* Gates and schoolmate, Paul Allen, were inspired by an article in Popular Electronics magazine about the first personal computer, the Altair 8800, to develop a version of the Basic programming language for the PC.

* 1973: Gates goes to Harvard University, where he lived down the hall from Steve Ballmer, now Microsoft's chief executive officer.

* 1975: 19-year-old Gates drops out of Harvard and co-founds Microsoft with Allen.

* 1980: International Business Machines Corp chooses Microsoft to write the operating system for the IBM personal computer, introduced in 1981.

* 1985: Microsoft launches Windows 1.0, the first version of the popular operating system.

* 1986: Microsoft went public on March 13 at $21 per share.

* 1986: Microsoft moves to corporate campus in Redmond, Washington.

* 1989: Microsoft introduces the earliest version of its Office software.

* Gates founds stock photography house Corbis, which he controls.

* 1994: Gates married Melinda French.

* 1994: The Justice Department files suit against Microsoft, alleging it engaged in anti-competitive marketing practices. The suit is ended by a 1995 consent decree.

* 1997: Microsoft acquires Hotmail, a free Web-based e-mail service co-founded by Sabeer Bhatia.