Brad Silverberg is an American computer scientist and businessman, most noted for his work at

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...

in 1990–1999 as Senior VP and product manager for

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated IE or MSIE) is a series of graphical user interface, graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft which was used in the Microsoft Wind ...

, and

Office An office is a space where an Organization, organization's employees perform Business administration, administrative Work (human activity), work in order to support and realize objects and Goals, plans, action theory, goals of the organizati ...

. He was named ''

PC Magazine ''PC Magazine'' (shortened as ''PCMag'') is an American computer magazine published by Ziff Davis. A print edition was published from 1982 to January 2009. Publication of online editions started in late 1994 and have continued to the present d ...

''s Person of the Year in 1995 for his leadership of

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturin ...

Early career

Silverberg earned a

BS degree A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

magna cum laude Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some So ...

'' in Computer Science from

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

, and an MS in Computer Science from

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...

. His first work experience was research at

SRI International SRI International (SRI) is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic d ...

, one of the four first

ARPANET The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical fou ...

nodes. Also early in his career Silverberg worked in the early 1980s at

Apple Computer Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue (totaling in 2021) and, as of June 2022, is the world's biggest company b ...

on the failed

Lisa Lisa or LISA may refer to: People People with the mononym * Lisa Lisa (born 1967), American actress and lead singer of the Cult Jam * Lisa (Japanese musician, born 1974), stylized "LISA", Japanese singer and producer * Lisa Komine (born 1978), J ...

project. Later Silverberg was hired as the first employee at Analytica, a

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo County ...

startup. After 1985, he was VP of Engineering at

Borland Borland Software Corporation was a computer technology company founded in 1983 by Niels Jensen, Ole Henriksen, Mogens Glad and Philippe Kahn. Its main business was the development and sale of software development and software deployment product ...

after their acquisition of Analytica.

Career at Microsoft

In 1990, Silverberg left Borland to lead the personal systems division at Microsoft. A number of people left Borland to follow him at Microsoft in the following years, leading to a number of failed lawsuits from Borland. At the start of his tenure, the personal systems division was already a prime moneymaker with

, at that time sold only through

OEM An original equipment manufacturer (OEM) is generally perceived as a company that produces non-aftermarket parts and equipment that may be marketed by another manufacturer. It is a common industry term recognized and used by many professional or ...

s. After shipping Windows 95, he turned his full-time focus onto the Internet efforts at Microsoft, which led to the creation of the Internet Platform and Tools Division 1996, which he led. In 1997, Silverberg was given responsibilities for Office but his principal interest remained with the Internet. He took a

sabbatical A sabbatical (from the Hebrew: (i.e., Sabbath); in Latin ; Greek: ) is a rest or break from work. The concept of the sabbatical is based on the Biblical practice of ''shmita'' (sabbatical year), which is related to agriculture. According to ...

that summer to reflect on where the Internet was going at Microsoft. He returned as a part-time consultant for new president and later CEO,

Steve Ballmer Steven Anthony Ballmer (; March 24, 1956) is an American business magnate and investor who served as the chief executive officer of Microsoft from 2000 to 2014. He is the current owner of the Los Angeles Clippers of the National Basketball Associ ...

. On 29 October 1999, he left Microsoft.

Current career

In March 2000, he led a group of former Microsoft executives to found Ignition, a venture capital firm. Silverberg works as a partner of the firm.

References

External links

Ignition: Brad Silverberg biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Silverberg, Brad Microsoft employees Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Brown University alumni University of Toronto alumni