Arm Holdings vs Microsoft: Founders, CEOs and History

Company facts

Founders

CEOs and their tenures

Timeline: Arm Holdings and Microsoft side by side

1. 1975Microsoft

   Microsoft Founded

   Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft after recognizing that the Altair 8800 needed usable programming software. Their first product, Altair BASIC, turned a hobbyist computer kit into a programmable platform.

2. 1981Microsoft

   MS-DOS Ships With IBM PC

   IBM introduced its personal computer with MS-DOS 1.0 and other Microsoft products. The milestone mattered because Microsoft's operating-system work moved from a small software supplier's project into the emerging corporate PC standard.

3. 1985Arm Holdings

   ARM1 Processor First Silicon

   The first ARM processor, ARM1, reached silicon at Acorn Computers, designed by Sophie Wilson, who wrote the instruction set, and Steve Furber, who led the hardware.

4. 1985Microsoft

   Windows Launch

   The release of Windows 1.0 began Microsoft's long move from command-line operating systems to graphical personal computing. The first version was not an instant blockbuster, but it gave Microsoft a user-interface path that could evolve with PC hardware.

5. 1986Microsoft

   Microsoft IPO

   Microsoft went public on the Nasdaq in March 1986.

6. 1990Arm Holdings

   Arm Founded as an Acorn, Apple and VLSI Joint Venture

   The company was incorporated in November 1990 as Widelogic Limited and renamed Advanced RISC Machines Limited on December 3, 1990, structured as a joint venture between Acorn Computers, Apple Computer and VLSI Technology.

7. 1990Microsoft

   Office Suite Release

   The bundling of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint into Microsoft Office created a productivity suite that became central to business work. The bundle simplified enterprise purchasing and made file compatibility a competitive weapon.

8. 1993Arm Holdings

   Apple Newton Ships with ARM610 and Arm Turns Profitable

   Apple launched the Newton MessagePad, powered by an ARM610 processor, the first significant consumer product built on an ARM-based chip.

9. 1995Microsoft

   Windows 95 Released

   Microsoft released Windows 95 in August 1995.

10. 1998Arm Holdings

    Dual Listing on the London Stock Exchange and Nasdaq

    Arm floated on April 17, 1998, trading in London and New York on the same day after being priced at 575p a share by Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and Cazenove. The company was renamed ARM Holdings at the listing and joined the FTSE 100.

11. 1998Microsoft

    U.S. Antitrust Case

    The U.S. Department of Justice accused Microsoft of using Windows power to suppress browser competition. The case mattered because it placed Microsoft's platform tactics under public and legal scrutiny at the height of its PC strong position.

12. 2001Arm Holdings

    Warren East Becomes Chief Executive

    Warren East was appointed chief executive in October 2001, succeeding Robin Saxby. Over the following twelve years Arm established the Cortex CPU and Mali GPU families and became the standard architecture for smartphones.

13. 2004Arm Holdings

    Artisan Components Acquired for $913 Million

    Arm bought Artisan Components, a designer of physical IP such as standard cell libraries, memory compilers and input and output cells, extending Arm from processor designs into the foundry-specific building blocks needed to fabricate a chip.

14. 2007Arm Holdings

    iPhone Launch Accelerates Smartphone Royalty Growth

    Apple launched the original iPhone with a Samsung-manufactured application processor built on an ARM11 core.

15. 2010Microsoft

    Azure Commercial Launch

    Azure gave Microsoft a way to compete in cloud infrastructure as enterprise customers began shifting workloads away from company-owned servers.

16. 2013Arm Holdings

    Simon Segars Succeeds Warren East as CEO

    Arm announced in March 2013 that Warren East would retire and that president Simon Segars, who joined Arm in 1991 as one of its early engineers, would become chief executive from July 1, 2013.

17. 2014Microsoft

    Satya Nadella CEO

    Satya Nadella became CEO and moved Microsoft away from a strategy that forced every product to serve Windows. He prioritized Azure, Microsoft 365, open source, Linux support, cross-platform software, and a more collaborative developer posture.

18. 2016Arm Holdings

    SoftBank Acquires Arm for ~$32.1 billion (24.3 Billion Pounds)

    SoftBank Group agreed on July 18, 2016 to acquire Arm Holdings for 24.3 billion pounds, about $31.4 billion in cash, and completed the deal on September 5, 2016.

19. 2016Microsoft

    LinkedIn Acquisition

    Microsoft agreed to acquire LinkedIn in 2016 for $26.2 billion in cash. The deal mattered because it added a professional identity network to a company already strong in Office, Dynamics, cloud services, recruiting tools, advertising, and enterprise sales.

20. 2018Microsoft

    GitHub Acquisition

    Microsoft acquired GitHub for $7.5 billion in stock, reversing years of developer skepticism toward the company. The acquisition placed Microsoft inside the daily workflow of software developers across languages, clouds, and operating systems.

21. 2020Arm Holdings

    Nvidia Agrees to Buy Arm for $40 Billion

    Nvidia announced an agreement to acquire Arm from SoftBank for about $40 billion in cash and stock.

22. 2022Arm Holdings

    Nvidia Deal Collapses and Rene Haas Becomes CEO

    Nvidia and SoftBank terminated the acquisition in February 2022 after the U.S. Federal Trade Commission sued to block it, the UK Competition and Markets Authority recommended against it and EU regulators opened a Phase II review.

23. 2023Arm Holdings

    Nasdaq IPO Prices at $51 and Raises $4.87 Billion

    Arm listed on Nasdaq on September 14, 2023 under the ticker ARM, pricing American depositary shares at $51 and raising about $4.87 billion at a valuation of roughly $54.5 billion. It was the largest U.S.

24. 2023Microsoft

    AI Leadership

    Microsoft's expanded OpenAI partnership and Copilot product rollout placed the company at the center of enterprise generative AI adoption.

25. 2023Microsoft

    Activision Blizzard Acquisition Closes

    Microsoft completed the Activision Blizzard acquisition after intense regulatory review. The deal added Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, Diablo, Overwatch, Candy Crush, and other franchises to Microsoft Gaming.

26. 2024Arm Holdings

    Fiscal 2024 Revenue Reaches $3.23 Billion

    Arm reported fiscal 2024 revenue of $3,233 million, up 21%, made up of $1,802 million of royalty revenue and $1,431 million of license and other revenue, with net income of $306 million.

27. 2025Arm Holdings

    Artisan Foundation IP Business Sold to Cadence

    Arm completed the sale of its Artisan foundation IP business, the standard cell libraries, memory compilers and general-purpose input and output blocks it had built up since the 2004 Artisan acquisition, to Cadence Design Systems on August 26, 2025 under an ag…

28. 2025Arm Holdings

    Lumex Client Platform Launched for On-Device AI

    In September 2025 Arm launched Lumex, its compute subsystem platform for flagship smartphones and next-generation PCs, pairing C1 CPUs and G1 GPUs with Scalable Matrix Extension version 2 for on-device AI.

29. 2025Arm Holdings

    Fiscal 2025 Revenue Passes $4 Billion

    Arm reported fiscal 2025 revenue of $4,007 million, up 24%, with royalty revenue of $2,168 million and license and other revenue of $1,839 million, and net income of $792 million.

30. 2026Arm Holdings

    Arm Launches the AGI CPU, Its First Production Silicon

    At the Arm Everywhere event in San Francisco on March 24, 2026, Arm introduced the Arm AGI CPU, the first chip it designed and sells as finished silicon rather than licensable IP.

31. 2026Arm Holdings

    Fiscal 2026 Revenue Reaches $4.92 Billion

    Arm reported fiscal 2026 revenue of $4,920 million, up 23% and a third consecutive year of growth above 20% since the IPO, with royalty revenue of $2,613 million, license and other revenue of $2,307 million and net income of $904 million.

Acquisitions

Questions about Arm Holdings vs Microsoft