Traf-O-Data - Wikipedia
Traf-O-Data was a business partnership between Bill Gates, Paul Allen and Paul Gilbert that existed in the 1970s. The objective was to read the raw data from roadway traffic counters and …
Traf-O-Data: The company before "Microsoft" - Substack
Jul 18, 2022 · Their ultimate goal was to produce and sell these Traf-O-Data computers to government agencies who wanted to automate their traffic data analysis. Gates and Allen …
The Failure That Built Microsoft Bill Gates, Traf-O-Data, and the ...
Sep 6, 2025 · This article dives deep into that story: how Traf-O-Data started, why it failed, what it taught, and how its so-called “flop” became the stepping stone to Gates’ and Allen’s ultimate …
The Very Early Careers of Bill Gates and Paul Allen
In Seattle, Washington, from 1973-74 high school students Bill Gates and Paul Allen, and Paul Gilbert founded a partnership called Traf-O-Data. The objective was to read the raw data from …
The Most Important Failure in Tech History
Mar 17, 2025 · Traf-O-Data wasn't just a failure – it worked like a compass. While the business itself barely sold $20,000 over its lifetime, it revealed something crucial: Gates and Allen …
Traf-O-Data - grokipedia.com
Traf-O-Data was a pioneering but short-lived venture founded in the early 1970s by teenagers Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Paul Gilbert in Seattle, Washington, aimed at automating the analysis …
Before Microsoft: How Traf-O-Data Paved the Road for Data
Aug 7, 2025 · Before founding Microsoft, Bill Gates and Paul Allen built Traf-O-Data, a system to automate traffic data processing for city planners.